Preamble

The House met at half-past Two o'clock

PRAYERS

[Mr. SPEAKER in the Chair]

Oral Answers to Questions — AGRICULTURE, FISHERIES AND FOOD

Farm Production

Sir G. Nabarro: asked the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food what import savingsad valoremwere achieved by extra British farm production in 1968; and what further expansion of his policy,ad valorem, he estimates will occur in 1969.

The Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food (Mr. Cledwyn Hughes): It is too early to be able to give figures for home production for the complete year 1968 or for 1969. The latest import figures available, however, show that the volume of imports of temperate type foods and animal feedingstuffs was at about the same level as in 1967. The whole of the growth in demand was, therefore, met by increased home production.

Sir G. Nabarro: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that hon. Members who represent important agricultural constituencies are dismayed by his turgid habits and slow progress in this matter of import substitution? Cannot he demonstrate greater energy in the national interest during 1969?

Mr. Hughes: The hon. Gentleman has made his monthly oration for the benefit of the farmers of Worcestershire. He should bear in mind that imports are remaining stable and that home production is meeting increased demand.

Egg Marketing Board

Sir G. Nabarro: asked the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food

whether he will now make a statement on the future of the Egg Marketing Board.

Mr. Scott-Hopkins: asked the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food what plans he has for reorganising the Egg Marketing Board; and if he will make a statement.

Mr. Eadie: asked the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food what proposals he has for changes in the organisation of egg marketing.

Mr. Pardoe: asked the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food if he will now make a further statement following his consideration of the Report of the Reorganisation Commission for Eggs.

Mr. Cledwyn Hughes: Yes, Sir. As the statement is rather long, I am making copies available in the Library now and I will, with permission, circulate it in the OFFICIAL REPORT.
Broadly, however, the Government accept that in the changing circumstances of the industry it would now be right to move to a free marketing system. We intend to phase out the egg subsidy over the next five years and propose to remove eggs from the guarantee under the Agriculture Acts from 1st April, 1974. We have asked the Marketing Board to continue with its present functions for the next two years, but we intend to establish a new central authority for eggs whose functions would include support buying and to move to a basically free marketing system from 1st April, 1971.
The Government intend to introduce the necessary legislation as soon as possible. In view of the phasing out of the subsidy and the transition to a free market, we shall also be embarking on discussions with overseas suppliers with a view to introducing minimum import prices for shell eggs and egg products.

Mr. Speaker: Order. Answers should be reasonably brief.

Sir G. Nabarro: I will read with avidity the statement when it appears. Is it the right hon. Gentleman's intention to abolish in forthcoming legislation the requirement to stamp shell eggs with a


lion? Is the new authority to comprise the interests, as forecast in the Daily Express, of producers, distributors and consumers, all in one board?

Mr. Speaker: Order. Supplementary questions should be reasonably brief, too.

Mr. Hughes: The answer to the second part of the hon. Gentleman's supplementary is, "Yes, Sir." The answer to the first part was given by me just before Christmas.

Mr. Pardoe: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that many hon. Members wholeheartedly welcome the fact that we are to go over to a free market in eggs? Will he consider what part was played in this by the Western Egg Pasteurising Company, of Camelford, and will he use his powers to ensure that it gets some recompense from the public purse for its efforts?

Mr. Hughes: That is an individual case about which there has been a great deal of correspondence. I do not think that it would be proper for me to comment on it when replying to a general statement.

Mr. Maclennan: What thought has been given to the special problems of egg producers in remoter parts of the country and particularly to the problems of the Orkneys?

Mr. Hughes: I am obliged to my hon. Friend for raising that point, which I have taken into account. Perhaps he will read my statement in the Library.

Mr. Godber: Hon. Members will read the full statement with great interest. It is an important statement and I reserve my position on it. Meanwhile, on the question of the import of both shell eggs and egg products, will the right hon. Gentleman ensure that minimum prices are adequate to give a fair return to home producers?

Mr. Hughes: I appreciate that point. These will, of course, be matters for negotiation.

Mr. Boston: What plans does my right hon. Friend have to ensure quality control at the retail level in the absence of packing station marks, since it will no longer be possible, as it has been up

to now, to trace causes of complaints back to the source?

Mr. Hughes: I appreciate that as well, but this is a matter for the consumer, the housewife, who has a great deal of discrimination in this matter.

Miss Quennell: What will be the position of those egg producers who have been brought before the Board's courts and who may now find themselves in a strange position in view of the announcement which he has just made?

Mr. Hughes: That raises a different matter. I should be grateful if the hon. Lady would place a Question down about it.

Following is the statement:
1. The Government have now reached conclusions on the Report of the Reorganisation Commission on Eggs, in the light of the views expressed by the interested organisations. I would like to take this opportunity of thanking Mr. Rowland Wright and his colleagues publicly for their valuable work.
2. The Government agree that in the changing circumstances of the industry, it would now be right to move to a free market, and to phase out the subsidy. We also accept that in the new situation the industry will need a more broadly based central body than the Egg Marketing Board with the kind of functions recommended by the Commission but with specific provision for representation of producer and trade interests. We believe however that the industry will need a reasonable transitional period to make an orderly adjustment to the new conditions and our aim is to complete the whole operation within the next five years, that is by 31st March, 1974.
3. The first step towards these objectives has already been taken with the removal of the "Lion" stamp. We propose to start phasing out the subsidy immediately with the objective of completing the operation by 31st March, 1974. During this period eggs will remain within the guarantee arrangements and progress towards our objective will be reviewed with the farming industry at each Annual Review. The subsidy will be phased out by reduction of the guaranteed price, and it will be put into a flat rate basis by abolishing the feed price formula, and accelerating the phasing out of the present profit and loss sharing arrangement. Moreover, to enable the phasing out to be completed within the transitional period, the limitation of 9 per cent. imposed by the Agriculture Act, 1957 on the maximum aggregate reduction in the guaranteed price permitted over any three year period, will be removed from eggs after 31st March, 1971. When the subsidy ceases after 31st March, 1974, eggs will no longer be covered by the guarantee arrangements
4. We think that the market should be allowed adequate time to adjust itself to the


removal of the stamp. We have therefore asked the Egg Marketing Board to continue with the present arrangements for fixing centrally basic producers and wholesale selling prices until 31st March, 1971. During this period the egg subsidy will continue to be paid to the Board. After that date the new body will come into operation and egg prices will be determined by the conditions of the commercial market instead of being centrally fixed. I am sure that we can count on the Board's co-operation in achieving this orderly transition.
5. After 31st March, 1971, the subsidy will be paid to the new central body whose trading functions will be confined to a limited amount of support buying to be determined each year in consultation with the Government. Until 31st March, 1974, the funds for this will be earmarked from the payment made to the authority under the guarantee, the balance being disbursed as a flat rate subsidy to producers in respect of first-quality eggs sold to packing stations. Thereafter, support buying will be the responsibility of the new authority and will be financed by a levy on the industry.
6. In view of the longer transitional period we are proposing, we do not consider that there is a case for any compensation to producers going out of egg production as was proposed by the Commission. We will, however, discuss with the Northern Ireland authorities the provision of special assistance towards sea transport costs for producers in Northern Ireland and similar provision will be made on this account for producers in the Orkneys.
7. The Commission emphasised in their report the need to safeguard United Kingdom producers from the risk of market disruption by excessively low priced imports. The Government accept this and intend to open discussions with overseas suppliers with a view to introducing minimum import prices both for shell eggs and for egg products. In the meantime the situation on imports will be kept under close review.
8. Many details of these proposals remain to be worked out and this will be done in consultation with the organisations concerned. The proposals will also entail legislation which the Government intend to introduce as soon as possible.

Food Imports (Levy System)

Mr. Buchanan-Smith: asked the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food if he will now introduce a levy system for food imports in order to achieve the objectives of expansion of home agriculture outlined on 12th November, 1968.

Mr. Cledwyn Hughes: No, Sir. I do not accept that the attainment of the extended selective expansion programme requires the abandonment of our present support system or the introduction of an across the board levy system.

Mr. Buchanan-Smith: May we have an assurance that, in the absence of effective import control through the levy system, sufficient money will be available from the Treasury at the Price Review in order to finance deficiency payments at a level necessary to provide the incentive needed for expansion?

Mr. Cledwyn Hughes: The hon. Gentleman must appreciate that these are matters for the annual Price Review discussions, which will shortly be taking place between the farmers' representatives and the Government.

Mr. Emrys Hughes: Is my right hon. Friend aware of the strong criticism of the levy system by some of the best informed farmers in Scotland, including the Chairman of the Milk Marketing Board and others? Is he further aware that they have asked the Conservative Party to change its policy? Will he take these matters into consideration?

Mr. Cledwyn Hughes: I have read with great interest the reactions of farmers to the declared policy of the Opposition.

Bacon

Mr. Buchanan-Smith: asked the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food what is to be the quota for home producers under the new bacon sharing agreement.

Mr. Cledwyn Hughes: The Bacon Market Sharing Understanding has to be reviewed not later than March, 1969. Discussions with our overseas suppliers are at present well under way and should be completed fairly soon. I will, of course, make an announcement when they are complete.

Mr. Buchanan-Smith: Can the right hon. Gentleman confirm or deny rumours that home producers are to be released from the restriction of quotas? If that is the case, will he accept that this release from the restriction of quotas can be of little meaning unless, at the same time, the producers are given a better price incentive at the Price Review?

Mr. Hughes: I cannot confirm or deny anything in advance of the final settlement, as the hon. Gentleman should know. The Government, as he is no doubt aware, are giving considerable assistance to the curing industry, both


directly through the curing industry stabilisation arrangements and, indirectly, through the fatstock guarantee scheme support for pig production.

Mr. Godber: Can the right hon. Gentleman give an assurance that, in considering this matter, he is taking into account the proposals of the "Little Neddy" in regard to increased pig production?

Mr. Hughes: Yes, Sir.

Agriculture (Net Output)

Mr. Stodart: asked the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food why the figure of agricultural net output has been lower between 1964–65 and 1967–68 compared with that between 1961–62 and 1964–65 or 1958–59 and 1961–62; and what steps he proposes to take to improve it.

Mr. Cledwyn Hughes: Output in the four year period 1964–65 to 1967–68, as forecast, was considerably higher than in the periods 1958–59 to 1961–62 or 1961–62 to 1964–65. As regards further expansion of output, I would refer the hon. Member to my statement on 12th November.

Mr. Stodart: Does not the right hon. Gentleman find considerable significance in the information, which he gave to my right hon. Friend after some probing? In view of that, does not he agree that some very radical changes in his policy are needed to correct the situation?

Mr. Hughes: The hon. Gentleman should study and consider carefully the reply I have given to his Question on output, which shows that output has gone up. The series of Questions by right hon. and hon. Members about figures over the years is a sterile and misleading exercise. One can select various years and get different results—for example, due to climate or disease.

Mr Bryant Godman Irvine: asked the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food of the rise of 32 per cent. in agricultural production for the year 1963–64 to 1967–68, how much was attributable to the year 1964–65, and how much to the remaining years.

The Joint Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food (Mr. John Mackie): Agricultural

net output—which I presume the hon. Member means from his figures, not production—rose by 7·9 per cent. between 1963–64 and 1964–65 and by 1·7 per cent. per annum between 1964–65 and 1967–68.

Mr. Irvine: Will the hon. Gentleman take this opportunity to make clear that the figure of 3·2 per cent. in a reply on 6th December was misleading?

Mr. Mackie: No, Sir. That figure was not misleading. It was the answer to the question.

Agricultural Agreements (Europe)

Sir B. Rhys Williams: asked the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food what part Her Majesty's Government intends to take in the development of new agricultural agreements between the countries of the European Economic Community; and what consultations are taking place with European Free Trade Association countries.

Mr. Cledwyn Hughes: As the United Kingdom is not yet a member of the European Economic Community, we are not in a position to take part in their internal discussions. On the last part of the Question, I would refer the hon. Member to the communiqué which was issued after the recent E.F.T.A. Ministerial Meeting in Vienna and circulated in the OFFICIAL REPORT on 26th November, 1968.—[Vol. 774, c. 88–9.]

Sir B. Rhys Williams: Does not the right hon. Gentleman appreciate that the breakdown of the Common Market agricultural policy is an extremely significant development? Does not he regard this as an opportunity for us to show ourselves to be good Europeans?

Mr. Hughes: We are in the posture of good Europeans and we are watching carefully the development of a common agricultural policy.

Agriculture (Long-Term Development)

Sir B. Rhys Williams: asked the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food what studies he has made of the ways in which British agricultural potential can profitably be developed in the


long-term in conjunction with the production policies of the principal food-producing countries of Western and Eastern Europe and of the Commonwealth; and what steps he is taking to prevent the development of surpluses such as the present glut of butter.

Mr. Cledwyn Hughes: Problems of surpluses on the world markets cannot be dealt with unilaterally, but the United Kingdom takes a full part in discussion in a number of international organisations. Our own policies are formulated with due regard to international considerations.

Sir B. Rhys Williams: Is it not necessary, for the sake of the British farming community, to give far greater consideration to long-term developments? Has the right hon. Gentleman considered sufficiently the implications of this totally unnecessary butter surplus? How can we be sure that there will not be similar surpluses developing in future?

Mr. Hughes: We are planning for the long term, as I made plain on 12th November. The Government are projecting policy to 1972–73—something which no Government have ever done before. We should certainly consider the surpluses accumulating in various parts of the world, but the hon. Gentleman is surely aware that this country does not produce surpluses.

Mr. Peyton: When is the right hon. Gentleman to make a statement on the problem of dairy products? Obviously, a very serious problem is piling up here and we do not want to imitate the example of the Europeans. Perhaps the right hon. Gentleman will be good enough to explain what he means by being "in the posture of good Europeans".

Mr. Hughes: That should have been apparent even to the hon. Gentleman We have made our application to join E.E.C. and that is our posture at present. I have made a number of statements and speeches about dairy products. There is a world problem of dairy products and we ourselves have a substantial problem in relation to cheese. The cost of cheese has been maintained at a stable level and the hon. Gentleman is no doubt aware of the actions I have taken.

Frozen Fish Fillets

Mr. Wall: asked the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food if he will make a statement on the effect of the 10 per cent. tariff on frozen fish fillets from European Free Trade Association countries.

The Joint Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food (Mr. James Hoy): My right hon. Friend expects the home industry to benefit but it is difficult, especially in the short term, to isolate the various factors which influence fish supplies and prices.

Mr. Wall: Does the right hon. Gentleman expect the level of imports to be reduced to the figure given in the Annexe of the Stockholm Agreement over a period of months? Can he say whether the reduction in imports has led to an increase in the price of fish?

Mr. Hoy: The action we took was to keep imports down to what had been agreed and we hope that it will be successful.

Mr. James Johnson: Is my hon. Friend aware that the comments and statements by the Minister when he visited Hull Fish Dock last week were well received by all sections of the fishing industry there? When will the President of the Board of Trade be dealing with these matters with other E.F.T.A. Ministers?

Mr. Hoy: I am grateful for what my hon. Friend has said but, as he knows, we are to have further conversations with our E.F.T.A. partners some time this year.

Deep Sea Fishing Fleet

Mr. Wall: asked the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food if he will make a statement on the proposed reorganisation of the deep sea fishing fleet.

Mr. Hoy: The discussions which the Industrial Reorganisation Corporation is having with the interests concerned are continuing, but my right hon. Friend is not in a position to make any statement

Mr. Wall: When does the hon. Gentleman hope to be able to make it? Is Government participation in any merger


intended? Do the discussions also include the distributing side of the various firms as well as the catchment side?

Mr. Hoy: It would be inadvisable for my right hon. Friend to make any comment until he has proposals from the people at present in consultation. It will be for them to make a report as soon as they can reach agreement or otherwise.

Mr. James Johnson: Will my hon. Friend take into account the fact that the Monopolies Commission some time ago turned down mergers on a large scale? Is he aware that there are many excellent small family firms which are doing a first-class job?

Mr. Hoy: I think that we are all aware of the result of the action taken by the Monopolies Commission. On the other hand, it would be wrong for my right hon. Friend to make any comment about proposals he has not yet seen. We are well aware that there are small firms in the industry whose interests must also be considered.

British Standard Time

Mr. Dalyell: asked the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food what representations he has now received from agricultural interests on British Standard Time; and what reply he has sent.

Mr. Monro: asked the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food what representations he has had from the agricultural industry regarding British Standard Time.

Mr. Dudley Smith: asked the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food what is the number of representations he has received from farmers and farming organisations about the continuance of British Standard Time; and what conclusions he has reached.

Mr. John Farr: asked the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food what representations he has received from the agricultural industry regarding the British Standard Time experiment; and what action he is taking.

Mr. John Mackie: My right hon. Friend has read comments in the farming Press and is aware that the National Farmers' Union is undertaking a review,

in consultation with its branches, but the only formal representations he has received since British Standard Time began have been from the hon. Member for Chigwell (Mr. Biggs-Davison) on behalf of an organisation in his constituency. I have nothing to add to the various Answers given by my right hon. Friends before Christmas.

Mr. Dalyell: Have the Government yet made any assessment of the effectts of frost, even in a fairly mild winter, in causing later work starts and consequent increases in production costs?

Mr. Mackie: No. There is the same amount of frost whether the time is an hour forward or an hour backward.

Mr. Monro: Will the Minister agree, when he is advising his right hon. Friend the Home Secretary, that it is not entirely a matter of statistics? Will he emphasise the misery of the long dark mornings and realise that it is quite impossible to do any work before 9.30 a.m. at the present time?

Mr. Mackie: There is a considerable difference of opinion—as the hon. Member knows, I move about among the agricultural community a good deal—as to whether a long dark morning or a long dark night is the more miserable.

Mr. Farr: Is not the Minister aware of the special case of farmers engaged purely on arable work, who cannot put their employees to looking after stock in the early hours of the morning? They are in considerable difficulty.

Mr. Mackie: I do not think they are. [HON. MEMBERS: "Oh."] I might point out to hon. Members opposite that I am probably the only Member who has had his Wellington boots on this morning. The question of arable farming is, I admit, different from stock farming, but we all have lights on tractors nowadays. A lot of us plough at night from choice, and an extra half hour or hour doing it in the morning does not seem to make a lot of difference.

Mr. Dudley Smith: Is not the best possible reason for abandoning the experiment the fact that the farming community in particular and the public in general dislike B.S.T. intensely? Is not this a profligate waste of agricultural working hours in the morning?

Mr. Mackie: As the hon. Member knows, it is an experiment for a period of three years. As I said in my Answer, the N.F.U. is making a survey of the situation and, naturally, we will pay attention to all these things in due course.

Mr. Stodart: Has any calculation or assessment been made of any additional costs that may have been incurred in this experiment? Secondly, when the review which has been promised is made at the end of March or April this year, will the hon. Gentleman, in any advice he gives on the agricultural situation, take into account the feelings of farmers north of the Border?

Mr. Mackie: Yes. We have made inquiries and find that, so far, the cost has been negligible. If the hon. Member means by the review the price review, it is not a review of working conditions. We will, however, take into consideration at the review anything that is said by the farming community.

Marine Sciences

Mr. Dalyell: asked the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food what he is doing to encourage the development of the marine sciences, and in particular to study the Atlantic salmon, with a view to its protection.

Mr. Hoy: My Department's laboratories are continuing their research into those aspects of the marine sciences which are of actual or potential importance to fisheries. So far as salmon are concerned, research is continuing into the relationship between the Greenland fishery and British stocks, and into salmon disease.

Mr. Dalyell: Is my hon. Friend aware of the importance of disease in salmon in this context?

Mr. Hoy: Yes, indeed, we are very much aware of it. I am sure that my hon. Friend will be grateful to know that it was Britain which took the leading part in this work. We are, of course, with certain friends, conducting research into this subject. So far, we have not found, nor nave they, the reasons for this.

Mr. Kimball: Is the Minister aware that the real damage to the Atlantic salmon is being done not in the Greenland fishery, but by the Danes driftnetting

in the Baring Sea? Will be bring robust pressure to bear upon the Danes and make it clear to them that their bacon quota will be cut unless they change their attitude with regard to salmon?

Mr. Hoy: I am certain that the hon. Member will be aware that it was as a result of the work and pressure of the British Government that at the last conference which dealt with this problem, a resolution was passed drawing to the attention not only of Denmark, but of every other country involved, what was happening. Indeed, I can tell the House that at the next meeting we propose to push it still further. In this case, once more Britain has a very fine record.

Cheese (Imports)

Mr. Peter Mills: asked the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food what progress he has made in his discussions with the Eireann Government over the supply of cheese to the United Kingdom.

Mr. Cledwyn Hughes: My negotiations with overseas suppliers are continuing. In mid-December, applications were made by the British industry to my right hon. Friend the President of the Board of Trade for anti-dumping or countervailing duties on imports of a wide range of cheeses. My right hon. Friend announced this morning that he has found a prima facie case and is proceeding to a full investigation. He has also said that, if there is evidence of a significant increase in dumped or subsidised imports meantime or of other developments likely to precipitate a collapse of market prices, provisional duties will be imposed immediately.

Mr. Mills: In welcoming that statement, may I ask the Minister to bear in mind that this delay, particularly with the Irish Government, cannot be tolerated any longer and that they must be convinced of the need to reduce their exports of cheese to this country? Will the hon. Gentleman redouble his efforts in this way?

Mr. Hughes: Certainly, we are negotiating as vigorously as we can with overseas suppliers. I am grateful to the hon. Member for the welcome he has given to the action which has now been taken and which, I agree, is significant.

Sir J. Langford-Holt: Is the Minister aware that the delay which occurs between the making of an application and the taking of a decision is the most dangerous in connection with any import? What steps is the hon. Gentleman taking to ensure that that interval is reduced to an absolute minimum?

Mr. Hughes: The hon. Member will be aware that this is a matter for my right hon. Friend the President of the Board of Trade. In this case, however, as he will know, and the House will appreciate, there was no delay and the action taken was very expeditious.

Home-Produced Mutton and Lamb

Mr. Peter Mills: asked the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food if he is satisfied with the percentage of home-produced mutton and lamb available to consumers; what steps he is taking to increase production of British lamb and mutton; and if he will make a statement.

Mr. Hoy: About two-fifths of our mutton and lamb is now produced at home, and in framing the balanced expansion programme announced on 12th November last, we took account of comparative trends in demand and in costs and the competing call on resources, especially on land, for this and other commodities. In the light of these factors we concluded that the scope for greater production lies primarily in the hills and uplands.

Mr. Mills: Will the Minister bear in mind that this decline is a serious trend and must be arrested? With our climate and our grass, and given suitable incentives to farmers, which is most important, we could produce far more lamb and mutton and thereby help our balance of payments problem.

Mr. Hoy: Yes, indeed, and we want to see the increase. The hon. Member will not have forgotten already the considerable extent to which we helped in the 1967 review. As I have said before, we expect this improvement to take place mainly in the hills and uplands and we have certainly given encouragement there.

Forestry (Administrative Control)

Mr. Kimball: asked the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food if he is

satisfied with the administrative control exercised by his Department in the field of forestry; and if he will make a statement.

Mr. John Mackie: Administrative control for forestry is vested in the Forestry Commission, not in my Department, although as the Forestry Minister for England my right hon. Friend can get advice on the broader aspects of forestry from his senior agricultural officials as well as from the Commission.

Mr. Kimball: Is the Minister aware that there appears to be absolutely no control at present over research projects? The Natural Environment Research Council is expanding its forestry institute, the Nature Conservancy is expanding its forestry research and now the Forestry Commission is building a new Forestry Research Unit at Edinburgh. This is empire-building and a waste of the taxpayers' money of the worst sort. Will the Minister look at it?

Mr. Mackie: Yes.

Mr. Hooson: Is the Minister also aware that there appears to be no control of private afforestation and that in central Wales many of the best sheep walks have been purchased by private forestry interests, thus causing great resentment among sheep farmers?

Mr. Mackie: My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Wales is, of course, responsible for forestry in Wales and it might be better for the hon. and learned Member to address his question to him. I am, however, surprised in any event that a member of the Liberal Party is worried about too much freedom.

Crops (Air Pollution)

Mr. John Hall: asked the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food what research is being undertaken into the effect on food production of increasing air pollution caused by vehicle exhaust gases.

Mr. John Mackie: Limited tests have been carried out by the National Agricultural Advisory Service in conjunction with the Macaulay Institute for Soil Research concerning the deposition of the lead content of exhaust fumes on crops growing near major roads. Work on several aspects of the problem is continuing at the Macaulay Institute.

Mr. Hall: Is the hon. Gentleman aware that research in America indicates that air pollution caused mainly by the emission of toxic matter from vehicle exhausts is causing a loss to agriculture of something like £500 million a year? Does not the hon. Gentleman consider that this experience of America warrants rather more research in this country than appears to be taking place?

Mr. Mackie: No. We have heard of the work in America, of course, and it is interesting work. We ourselves took a considerable number of samples in 1963 from roadside crops, and we have found deposits of lead, etc., but not in sufficient quantity or in such a way that the crops seem any worse. I will bear in mind what the hon. Member said, and if we feel that there is any necessity for increasing the present research, we will do so.

Hill Sheep Farms (Afforestation)

Mr. Monro: asked the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food how many hill sheep farms have been purchased for afforestation in each of the last three years.

Mr. John Mackie: The Forestry Commission purchased 32 hill sheep farms or parts of farms in 1966, 43 in 1967 and 50 in 1968.
Comparable figures for private purchases are not available.

Mr. Monro: Does not the accelerating trend of the sale of hill farms cause the Minister grave concern? Does it not highlight the poor returns and poor profitability from hill sheep farms? What steps will he take to reverse this trend?

Mr. Mackie: No, I do not think it is the case. The Forestry Commission, as the hon. Gentleman knows, has to buy land when it becomes available, and in competition with other people. It is the only way in which it can get land. In some cases, particularly in very high hill areas, forestry compares very favourably with hill farming.

Mr. Mackintosh: Is my hon. Friend aware of the grave distress caused in parts of Scotland at the large purchases not by the Forestry Commission but by private persons and companies who buy hill farms for afforestation? How far

does he think the subsidy given for land passed over to forestry is having an effect on the buying of farms and their utilisation for forestry, when they would be better kept, in the national interest, as sheep farms?

Mr. Mackie: We all know that assistance is given to private forestry and, naturally, this must have an effect on the demand and the prices being paid for land, but, as I say, these farms come on the market in a perfectly free way, and I do not think any Government would stop their sale by anything which would reduce the price and, if they did, I think there would be as severe criticisms as we are getting now.

Agriculture (Import Saving)

Mr. Dudley Smith: asked the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food if he is satisfied with the present level of imports of agricultural products into this country; and whether he will review his policy on this subject.

Mr. Cledwyn Hughes: I have repeatedly emphasised the value I attach to agriculture's import-saving rôle. The expansion programme I outlined on 12th November sets out a realistic import saving programme for the industry, based on the report of the Economic Development Committee for Agriculture. I do not consider that any further policy review is called for.

Mr. Dudley Smith: Does the Minister think there is now a case for taking a much harder look at milk product imports? Could he say what general discussions he is having in this whole sphere?

Mr. Hughes: I do not agree that a further review is called for. As I said in reply to an earlier supplementary question, one has to have regard to the situation in milk product surpluses throughout the world in developed countries today. We are looking at this very carefully indeed. As the hon. Gentleman knows, we meet our own demand for milk liquid consumption; we have quotas for butter, and are taking the action which I have described with cheese. But I would agree that this is a matter which must be kept constantly under review.

Mr. Stodart: Can the Minister say whether or not it is the case that, in the


discussions which he has been having with the National Farmers' Union, he has advised the union that, if we are to restrict imports, farmers must restrict home production, and that they have strongly rejected this advice?

Mr. Hughes: I have said no such thing to the leaders of the farming industry.

Potato Crop

Mr. Jopling: asked the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food whether he is satisfied that the 1969 potato crop will be sufficient to meet home demands, in view of the proposal by the Potato Marketing Board to impose an 80 per cent. quota acreage on home producers; and if he will make a statement.

Mr. Hoy: After discussions with the Farmers' Unions and the agricultural Departments, the Potato Marketing Board increased the quota for the 1969 acreage to 85 per cent. of basic acreage. This is calculated to secure plantings by registered producers consistent with the total United Kingdom acreage of 650,000 which my right hon. Friend mentioned in the House on 11th July last year as the acreage that would be sufficient to meet home demand for maincrop potatoes in 1969–70 if yields are not significantly below the level expected in that year.

Mr. Jopling: Is not the Minister aware that potato yields are extremely volatile and that one cannot rely on them? Is he not aware that the 80 per cent. quota bears considerable risks? Will he give an assurance to the housewives of this country that in the next 18 months they can expect reasonable supplies at reasonable prices?

Mr. Hoy: Yes, we are aware that there can be changes in the yields. I think this is well known. What we have also to take care of is that we do not over-supply and bring down the market and make it unprofitable for the industry and those who produce the potatoes.

Sir J. Gilmour: Has the Minister made an estimate of the amount of main crop potato equivalent coming into the country in manufactured form throughout the year?

Mr. Hoy: No, I would not like to give an assurance on that just at the moment. As the hon. Gentleman knows, that was

dealt with and comes in another Question. What I was asked was what the acreage was. I think hon. Members know that this is done in consultation with the N.F.U.s, and the final decision is for the Potato Marketing Board.

Mr. John Hall: Would the hon. Gentleman not agree that the record of the Potato Marketing Board over recent years would make it a candidate for the same sort of reorganisation he is arranging for the Egg Marketing Board?

Mr. Hoy: No.

Poultry (Marek's Disease)

Mr. Eadie: asked the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food if he is satisfied with the present arrangements for containing the spread of Marek's disease amongst poultry; what was the incidence of the disease in 1966, 1967 and 1968; and if he will make a statement.

Mr. John Mackie: Marek's disease is not notifiable and no precise information is available as to its incidence. High standards of hygiene by individual producers and the segregation of young birds from older stock remain the most effective means of control.

Mr. Eadie: Would my hon. Friend confirm that this disease is practically unknown in Scotland, and would he also not agree that some people consider that the so-called modern methods of egg production may bring the disease where it has not previously existed?

Mr. Mackie: I did not quite hear my hon. Friend. Did he say that the disease is comparatively unknown in Scotland?

Mr. Eadie: Yes.

Mr. Mackie: Oh, no. Marek's disease is the old fowl paralysis, and I am afraid I had experience of it way back in the 'thirties. It is anything but unknown. As far as we can find out, there is simply no indication that intensive poultry keeping is having the effect of increasing the incidence of this disease.

Foot-and-Mouth Disease (Claims)

Mr. Grant-Ferris: asked the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food how many claims, involving what amount of money, still remain unsettled as far as the ancillary services are concerned


in connection with the outbreak of foot-and-mouth disease in Cheshire in 1967–68.

Mr. John Mackie: The claims submitted do not distinguish between work in Cheshire and work elsewhere. But for the entire outbreak only three claims, amounting to some £1,700, are still under examination in respect of ancillary services such as slaughter of animals, disposal of carcases and disinfection.

Mr. Grant-Ferris: Is it not rather a bad show that these claims are not settled already, and will the hon. Gentleman do everything possible to expedite these claims and let us have a finish to that dreadful year we had last year once for all?

Mr. Mackie: When I tell the hon. Member that we have had to deal with 10,500 claims on ancillary matters totalling £2½ million, I think he may agree that it is a pretty good show that there are only three outstanding, even after this amount of time.

Beef Production

Mr. Farr: asked the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food by how much he anticipates home beef production will expand in 1969; and by how much it expanded in 1968.

Mr. Hoy: Home production of beef in 1968 is estimated to be about 1 per cent. less than in 1967. This is due largely to the adverse effects of the foot-and-mouth epidemic and the more normal rate of calf slaughterings in 1966 to 1967 compared with the unusually low rate in 1965 to 1966. However, we expect a resumed expansion with production in the coming year reaching at least 1967 levels, that is, some 9 per cent. greater than in 1966.

Mr. Farr: I am grateful to the Minister for the details he has gone into, but the fact nevertheless remains that, after all those statistics, the picture is still an appalling one. Will he recognise that beef producers in this country have had a desperate 12 months, and that, unless some real recoupment is offered to them for all the extra costs they have had to incur, they will just not consider the game worth the candle in the next 12 months and will switch into some other form of production?

Mr. Hoy: I must tell the hon. Member that that is not true. The trends are all in an upward direction. He knows as well as I do that, when we have lost about 100,000 animals through foot-and-mouth, there is obviously bound to be a restriction in the figures. Any decision on grant and so on will be taken in the Annual Price Review, as he knows.

Mr. Godber: Will the Joint Parliamentary Secretary not acknowledge that, although the foot-and-mouth epidemic certainly had some effect, which we do not deny for a moment, nevertheless the trend is not satisfactory in the light of the programme announced by the Government as long ago as 1965 of the maximum possible expansion of beef production? Will he and his right hon. Friend ensure that action is taken at the Price Review to put this right?

Mr. Hoy: We would like to see it higher, we will get it higher and it will be higher this year. As the right hon. Gentleman knows, restocking has been very considerable and I am certain that, after the appalling diseases of last year, the industry can look for a much better year this year unless anything happens that nobody can foresee.

Sea Fishing Statistical Tables

Mr. W. H. K. Baker: asked the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food if in future he will arrange for the table relating to the supplies of fish per head moving into human consumption as shown in the Sea Fishing Statistical Tables, to indicate white fish and other types of fish separately.

Mr. Hoy: Yes, Sir; to the extent that the herring component in the total for fresh, frozen and cured fish will be shown separately.

Mr. W. H. K. Baker: asked the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food if, for convenience, he will ensure that in future sprats are shown separately from other white fish in landings data in the Sea Fishing Statistical Tables.

Mr. Hoy: This is already done in the tables published by my Department for countries and major ports in the United Kingdom, and for Scotland in the Scottish Sea Fisheries Statistical Tables for


which my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Scotland is responsible.

Mr. Baker: Does not the hon. Gentleman realise that the Fishing Economics Research Unit of the White Fish Authority completely disagrees with the thesis that he has just put forward; that these figures are not available and that it is looking into the size of the market in the interests of the fishing industry? Will he not think again and have this carried out?

Mr. Hoy: No, if the hon. Gentleman is not satisfied with the reports made by the Scottish Office in this respect, perhaps he will put down a Question to the Secretary of State for Scotland.

Northumberland Committee (Report)

Mr. Stodart: asked the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food if he has now received the interim report of the Northumberland Committee; and when he proposes to publish it.

Mr. Cledwyn Hughes: The Duke of Northumberland has informed me that he hopes to let me have the first part of his Committee's report in the spring. I will publish it as soon as possible after that.

Mr. Stodart: In view of the memories which so many of us have of the foot-and-mouth tragedies and the great importance which will be attached to the report, will the right hon. Gentleman represent to his right hon. Friend that we should debate the report soon after it has been published?

Mr. Hughes: Yes, I appreciate the need for a debate, and I am sure that this can be arranged through the usual channels.

Sir Clive Bossom: Will the Minister ask the Northumberland Committee to issue with the interim report a statement about the export of meat from South America? If we are going to stop this meat the sooner we know the better, as a tremendous tonnage is already on the high seas coming to this country.

Mr. Hughes: The hon. Member will be aware that the terms of reference to the Committee were very wide, and the Committee has visited South America.

Agriculture (Investment Incentives)

Mr. J. E. B. Hill: asked the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food whether he is satisfied that the present investment incentives in agriculture are adequate to sustain the expansion programme announced on 12th November; and if he will make a statement.

Mr. Cledwyn Hughes: Estimated gross fixed capital formation in agriculture is rising. One of the questions which will need to be considered at the Annual Review is whether the current trend will provide the resources for investment needed for the selective expansion of agriculture at which we are aiming.

Mr. Hill: In so far as capital for the expansion programme is expected to come from increased income, is it not essential to maintain the incentives to plough back profits into new investment and not, for example, to cut the investment grants, as happened at the beginning of this year? Will the Minister therefore not accede to the N.F.U. request to go back to the simpler and more liberal system of investment allowances?

Mr. Hughes: The hon. Member will be aware that when the investment allowances were abolished not only were investment grants introduced but considerable improvements were made in the Horticulture Improvement Scheme and initial allowances. The House will know that the advantages of the new investment grants are that farmers know beforehand what grant they will receive, they are available to those who are not paying tax and they are paid more promptly.

Mr. Mackintosh: In view of the importance of carrying out the expansion programme announced by my right hon. Friend on 12th November, will my right hon. Friend consider in the interim, between now and the publication of the Annual Review, issuing a Green Paper in which the alternatives, the cost of the various types of incentive and the likely result of these incentives are set out, so that the House and the public will know the alternative methods of achieving the programme and the likely cost to the taxpayer?

Mr. Hughes: A good deal of that information is already available. My hon.


Friend, while making a valuable suggestion, has asked me to produce a very complex document in a short period of time but, looking to the future, I will consider what he says.

Mr. Prior: Is the Minister aware that there is only one way of providing an incentive to the farming industry, and that is to pay them more? If he does that all the other incentives will be unnecessary.

Balance of Payments Contribution

Mr. J. E. B. Hill: asked the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food what arrangements he is making to promote further research into the net contributions made by agriculture and other industries for which he is responsible to the balance of payments, either in the form of import saving or by export earnings.

Mr. Cledwyn Hughes: It is now well established that agriculture, and other industries for which I am responsible, make a valuable contribution to the balance of payments.

Mr. Hill: Will the Minister take seriously the; criticism in the N.E.D.C. Report that more research is badly needed into this question in the agricultural and other industries? Should there not be, therefore, a continuing study of the problem? Will the Minister also say what he is doing about forestry with its very high timber imports?

Mr. Hughes: A great deal of research is going on both within the Government and in private industry. My Ministry has a special fund with which to finance research projects on particular topics in and through British universities. The fund is at present almost wholly employed on research into the effect of capital investment in agriculture and into the problem of small farms, two very important subjects.

Mr. Maxwell-Hyslop: Is not the Minister aware that research is not needed to know that the returns on new agricultural investment are inadequate to use borrowed money for that purpose and the profits too low to yield new investment capital from that source?

Mr. Hughes: A good deal of research is needed into the effects on the farming

industry of the policy of the party opposite.

Sir W. Bromley-Davenport: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that the egg producers in this country are continually being told that they are producing more eggs than the nation requires? Why not, therefore, stop the importation of all foreign eggs and so give home producers a fair chance of earning a proper living and thus help with the balance of payments problem?

Mr. Hughes: The hon. and gallant Gentleman is, as usual, half an hour too late. I dealt with eggs half an hour ago.

Sir W. Bromley-Davenport: Inadequately.

Haddock Fillets

Mr. Wolrige-Gordon: asked the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food if he will make a statement about the present shortage of haddock fillets.

Mr. Hoy: I am not aware of any such shortage. British landings of haddock for the first 11 months of 1968 were above the 1967 level; though there was some decline, particularly in Scotland, towards the end of the year. I am informed that landings in Scotland are expected to improve this year.

Mr. Wolrige-Gordon: Is the Minister aware that when I tabled this Question there were reports of what could be termed a commercial famine in the supply of fish? I am glad to hear that the situation has improved.

Mr. Peyton: Is the Minister aware that, while many of us may be critical of the Government's policy in many matters, very few of us see a decisive rôle for it in this sphere?

Mr. Hoy: Perhaps on this side of the House we have a greater respect for the fishing industry than has the hon. Gentleman.

Onions (Grading)

Mr. Alasdair Mackenzie: asked the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food if he will consider introducing a quality grading system for British-grown onions.

Mr. Hoy: My right hon. Friend will certainly keep this in mind when considering what further commodities should become subject to statutory grading.

Mr. Mackenzie: Since it is clear that only a minority of home producers are able to compete with imported produce, would it not be an incentive to home growers if they were given greater assistance so that they could compete?

Mr. Hoy: I sympathise with the hon. Gentleman. We will not forget what he says. However, we are trying to make a success of the present statutory grading schemes which brought in apples and pears in 1967 and cucumbers and cauliflowers last year. In looking to the future, however, we shall not overlook his point.

Agricultural Workers (Wages)

Miss Quennell: asked the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food what is now the national average weekly wage of agricultural workers; and what he estimates the national average weekly earnings of agricultural workers to be.

Mr. John Mackie: The current national statutory minimum wage for adult male agricultural workers in England and Wales is £11 11s. for a standard week of 44 hours. It is estimated that total average weekly earnings of all hired adult male regular whole-time agricultural workers in England and Wales was £15 13s. 9d. in the year ending 30th September, 1968.

Miss Quennell: I am obliged to the hon. Gentleman for that information. However, in view of the fact that it is estimated that the national average wage for industrial workers is between £22 and £23 a week, and in view of the fact that Report No. 25 of the National Board for Prices and Incomes was issued only in the spring of 1967, why did the hon. Gentleman not make representations to his right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Employment and Productivity when she referred the recent agricultural agreement to the National Board?

Mr. Mackie: I know of the difference between agricultural wages and industrial wages. It is a long-standing one,

and we are doing our best to close the gap. The Agricultural Wages Board is an autonomous body, and it is the job of that body to deal with the matter. As for the National Board for Prices and Incomes, I have nothing to add to the Answer given to the hon. Lady by my hon. Friend the Joint Under-Secretary of State for Employment and Productivity on Monday.

Mr. Hazell: Does my hon. Friend really agree that the Agricultural Wages Board is an autonomous body, in view of the fact that its recent decision has now been referred to the National Board for Prices and Incomes?

Mr. Mackie: The National Board for Prices and Incomes is a statutory body as well. If any Ministry refers a wage question to it, it is done on a statutory basis.

Mr. Godber: If the hon. Gentleman is seriously telling the House that the Government are trying to reduce the disparity between these wage levels, why did the Government refer this issue to the National Board for Prices and Incomes?

Mr. Mackie: The right hon. Gentleman knows very well that this is a system which has been brought into being to try to control inflation and keep prices and incomes in some relationship. We have a wide spectrum of incomes, and it is not a good argument to say that a particularly low income should not be looked at. We have asked the National Board for Prices and Incomes to give us its reply before 3rd February, when the wages order is due to come into operation. It has promised to do that.

Mr. Mackintosh: The N.E.D.C. Report states that, if the Minister's own target of expansion is to be achieved, the average level of agricultural wages has to be raised from its 70 per cent. to 80 per cent. of present industrial wages. As this is the Minister's own objective, and as the record of productivity of agricultural workers of 6 per cent. is unequalled in the country, did he have words with his right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Employment and Productivity before this matter was referred to the National Board for Prices and Incomes?

Mr. Mackie: Of course we had consultations with my right hon. Friend—

Mr. Mackintosh: What did my hon. Friend say?

Mr. Mackie: I realise the inexperience of my hon. Friend, but it is not usual for consultations of that nature to be made public.

Mr. Prior: Is it not a fact that, if we are to get the expansion that we need, we require more agricultural workers of the right age? How does the hon. Gentleman reconcile what he is allowing his Government to do to agricultural workers with that point? Is this not a clear case of Government double-talk?

Mr. Mackie: I do not agree that it is absolutely clear that we need more agricultural workers. However, if we look at the record of right hon. and hon. Gentlemen opposite, in the four years to June, 1964—[Interruption.]—I suggest that the hon. and gallant Member for Knutsford (Sir W. Bromley-Davenport) should step his baying and listen—there was a drop of 91,100. From June, 1964, to 1968, it was 89,700. That is the general picture of the efficiency of the industry. The hon. Member for Lowestoft (Mr. Prior) knows this very well.

Mr. Gardner: Disregarding the antics and cheering of right hon. and hon. Gentlemen opposite, will my hon. Friend accept that many of us who have supported and still support the prices and incomes policy none the less regard agricultural workers as among the lowest paid in Britain? In view of that, will he make the strongest representations to his right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Employment and Productivity about this reference?

Mr. Mackie: All these matters are borne in mind.

Sir W. Bromley-Davenport: What mind?

Home-Grown Sugar

Miss Quennell: asked the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food what is the proportion of British-grown sugar in the total consumption.

Mr. Hoy: In 1967, 34 per cent. Figures for 1968 are not yet available.

Miss Quennell: Can the hon. Gentleman say what work his Department has done to investigate the practical aspects of implementing the "Little Neddy" Report for the expansion of the sugar beet crop, bearing in mind that no really suitable break crop has been discovered and that this offers an admirable break crop as well as an import saver?

Mr. Hoy: As the hon. Lady knows, we have studied the possibility of a break crop. But we have to consider what we are to do in line with the Commonwealth Sugar Agreement. Many hon. Members in all parts of the House urged us to maintain the Agreement and, when we do, obviously it imposes limitations on beet.

Fresh Vegetables (Packaging Material)

Mr. Hastings: asked the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food what estimate he has made of the increased cost of fresh vegetables, grown in this country, caused by the 50 per cent. deposit charge on imported packaging material.

Mr. Hoy: The effect of the import deposits scheme cannot be assessed separately from other factors affecting the cost of imported packaging materials and the cost of fresh vegetables.

Mr. Hastings: Does the hon. Gentleman realise that this deposit scheme has put 5 per cent. on the cost of sprout nets, containers and boxes and that that places our growers at a serious disadvantage compared with importers of vegetables? When he talks of a £160 million expansion, what is the point if the Government price our growers out of the home market? Will he reconsider exempting these items?

Mr. Hoy: I would not like to confirm the hon. Gentleman's figure. My information is that any effect that the scheme might have on prices would be negligible.

Wine

Mr. David Mitchell: asked the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food whether he is satisfied with the working of the rule as it affects price levels whereby price increases in the wine trade are notified to his department; and what is his estimate of the sum which the prices and incomes policy has saved


the consuming public in respect of wine and wine-based products.

Mr. Hoy: My right hon. Friend is satisfied with the way in which the special early warning arrangements for wine are working; and there is no evidence of any unjustified price increase. It would be impracticable to try to quantify the effect of this, or any other, early warning arrangement.

Mr. Mitchell: Does not the hon. Gentleman agree that the more successful the policy is, the greater will be the increase in consumers' purchasing power, the greater the imports, and the worse for our balance of payments?

Mr. Hoy: What we have been doing is to try to keep matters in check. It is true that consumer expenditure on wine is rising. That rise is caused by the rise in taxation and, frankly, by the amount of wine being consumed.

Lowland Sheep

Mr. Deedes: asked the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food whether he accepts the recommendation of the National Economic Development Council in respect of lowland sheep; and if he will make a statement.

Mr. Cledwyn Hughes: I agree with the E.D.C. assessment that any significant expansion of lowland sheep production now could only be at the expense of other livestock and crops, and the general policy has been to encourage a shift to the hills and uplands. This does not mean there is no place for lowland sheep or that their production is being deliberately discouraged. They remain valuable to the husbandry of many lowland farms particularly as a break crop for those growing cereals.

Mr. Deedes: Can the right hon. Gentleman say what representations he has had from breed societies about the N.E.D.C. Report?

Mr. Hughes: We are in constant touch with breed societies and no such requests have come from them. They are satisfied with our present policy.

Mr. Godber: Has the right hon. Gentleman been in touch with the Grassland

Institute at Hurley in connection with its work on sheep? When he is considering the views of the Institute will not he reconsider the possibility of expanding lowland sheep production?

Mr. Hughes: I shall be glad to consider that.

Departmental Staff

Mr. Kitson: asked the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food how many people were employed by his Department on 1st October, 1964; and how many were employed on 1st October, 1968.

Mr. Mackie: The number of staff employed by my Department on 1st October, 1964, was 15,566 and on 1st October, 1968, was 16,139.

Mr. Kitson: Can the hon. Gentleman say why, when there has been a considerable reduction in the number of holdings and a considerable reduction in the number of people employed in the industry, it is necessary to have more people to administer his Department?

Mr. Mackie: Most of the reduction is in the number of smallholdings and nonviable holdings, which do not cause any work at all. [Interruption.] Oh, yes. Many of the holdings are of a non-viable character and are not holdings that we have to deal with through farming schemes of any description. I have a long list of the extra work we have done since taking over in 1964. It is too long a list to give now, but I will send it to the hon. Gentleman and he will see where the extra people are employed.

Mr. Stodart: Can the hon. Gentleman say whether, like the Scottish Office, his Ministry has put in a computer in order to save labour and has had to employ 100 people to work it?

Mr. Mackie: I should require notice of that Question. We have put in a computer.

Mr. Costain: Can the Minister state the cost of this additional staff and the extra accommodation and offices required to house it?

Mr. Mackie: Not without notice.

HOUSE OF COMMONS (LUNCHEON INVITATIONS)

Mr. Lipton: asked the Lord President of the Council whether he has received a copy of the invitation issued by the National Association of Bookmakers to luncheons to be held in the House of Commons on Thursday, 23rd January, and Monday, 27th January; and whether he will make a statement.

The Lord President of the Council and Leader of the House of Commons (Mr. Fred Peart): I understand that inadvertently these invitations did not bear the sponsoring Member's name. The error is regretted and apologies have been made.

Mr. Lipton: In future, will my right hon. Friend see that, when any outside body seeks to make use of the refreshment facilities of this House, the rule is observed that the name of the hon. Member sponsoring the function shall appear on the invitations?

Mr. Peart: I accept that. However, in this case the error is regretted, and apologies have been made, so perhaps I might leave it at that.

Mr. Arthur Lewis: Mr. Speaker, as the sponsoring hon. Member, may I apologise to you, to my right hon. Friend the Leader of the House and to the appropriate Committee and explain that I acted quite correctly? However, the organising association, which lacked knowledge and experience, omitted in the first instance to put my name on the invitation. The omission was immediately rectified, and apologies have been sent. I asked my hon. Friend the Member for Brixton (Mr. Lipton) to discuss the matter with me. I wish that he had.

Mr. Peart: I accept that. My hon. Friend the Member for West Ham, North (Mr. Arthur Lewis) is quite right. Immediately the inadvertent error was noticed, apologies were made.

BORDERS DEVELOPMENT

3.30 p.m.

Mr. David Steel: I beg to move,
That leave be given to bring in a Bill to set up a Borders Development Board; to define its powers; to advance the economic development of the counties of Berwickshire, Roxburghshire, Selkirkshire and Peebles-shire; and for purposes connected therewith.
This is not a new proposal. I first became interested in this possibility in 1964, when I wrote a pamphlet on the subject of the development of the Border Counties of Scotland. In 1966, I was fortunate enough to secure a place in the Ballot for Private Members' Bills and I inquired of the Government whether they would facilitate a Bill of this kind. At that time—

Mr. Speaker: Order. It is impossible to make a speech against a background of multifarious conversations.

Mr. Steel: At that time the Government indicated that they were not willing to facilitate the passage of such a Bill. To be fair to them, one reason was that we had not had time to assess the impact of the Highlands and Islands Development Act and the Board set up under that Act.
The proposal was supported in 1965 by a resolution of the Scottish Trades Union Congress, and it has also been consistently supported by the hon. Member for Berwick and East Lothian (Mr. Mackintosh). It may be asked why this subject has been raised again at this time. I cannot do better, in replying to that question, than to quote from an article in The Scotsman recently, by Mr. Chris Baur, that newspaper's industrial correspondent. Talking of the Government's economic planning in Scotland, he said:
Alongside this intimate examination of selected areas the Government have constructed a proliferation of planning advisory groups, flowing upwards to the central body, the Scottish Economic Planning Council. These local groups have been designed to secure local participation in regional planning—short of evolving some new democratic mechanism which would embrace popular feeling. It is in the Boarders that this approach to planning growth points, and trying to involve the locals, has been tested first. It has not worked well.
I submit that the reason it has not worked well is that there is no adequate


machinery to get development under way. The Minister of State for Scotland, whom I am glad to see here, suggested that the Government's development programme for the area would cost about £50 million between 1965 and 1980, but this revenue comes from a widely varied range of sources. It comes from the rates of a multiplicity of very small local authorities, from road grants of the Scottish Development Department and from grants from the Board of Trade, and the Machinery of the Scottish Special Housing Association. There is no one method by which this development is financed.
Another reason for the delay is the nature of the geography of the area. The main development proposal of the Government's plan was the "trigger" development of 1,000 houses at Tweed-bank. This is situated in Roxburghshire, but economically will benefit Galashiels, in Selkirkshire, and have only a marginal effect on the ratepayers in Roxburghshire who are, naturally, more interested in developing their own towns and have, therefore, shown less than total and urgent enthusiasm for the project.
I suggest that it is not good enough to wait until the Royal Commission on the Reform of Local Government has reported and until we have what I hope will be a new regional local authority covering the whole of the Borders. Some action must be taken now to overcome these difficulties.
I propose, in the Bill, to give the Borders Development Board much the same powers as are possessed by the Highland Development Board. Incidentally, it is worth observing that the rate of depopulation over the last 20 years in the Borders has been much higher than in the Highlands. The Board's powers, as in the case of the Highlands Development Board, would be to promote, assist and undertake measures to implement

proposals for economic development. There would be the same statutory requirements to consult local authorities and the existing Economic Consultative Group. There would be powers to acquire land and to set up industries.
In conclusion, I believe that there is now a need for some move on the Government's part to restore confidence in their own development programme in the area. The Tweedbank scheme is now two years late in its timetable and the closure of the railway line in the area has been a serious blow. The result is that there was in one church in my constituency last week a sermon by a minister named, appropriately, Maben, in which he quoted St. Paul (II Corinthians). He said:
We are afflicted but not crushed; perplexed but not in despair; persecuted but not forsaken; struck down but not destroyed.
I appeal to the Government to think again about their attitude to a Border Development Board. I believe that if they were willing to facilitate the passage of my Bill it would give the area a much-needed reassurance that the Government are determined to press ahead with plans for the economic development of the region.

Question put and agreed to.

Bill ordered to be brought in by Mr. David Steel and Mr. John P. Mackintosh.

BORDERS DEVELOPMENT

Bill to set up a Borders Development Board; to define its powers; to advance the economic development of the counties of Berwickshire, Roxburghshire, Selkirkshire and Peebles-shire; and for purposes connected therewith, presented accordingly and read the First time; to be read a Second time upon Friday, 14th February, and to be printed. [Bill 68.]

Orders of the Day — IMMIGRATION APPEALS BILL

Order for Second Reading read.

3.39 p.m.

The Secretary of State for the Home Department (Mr. James Callaghan): I beg to move, That the Bill be now read a Second time.
This is a Bill with two purposes. Part 1 provides for the introduction of a system of appeals against decisions taken in the administration of immigration control under the twin Acts—the Commonwealth Immigrants Act and the Aliens Restriction Act, 1914—and Part II amends the law concerning the deportation of Commonwealth citizens. I should like to take those matters in turn.
The right of appeal, which is provided in Part I, meets a view expressed by hon. Members on both sides of the House. Pressure has been brought to bear from time to time upon the Government to introduce a system of this sort. The system that: I propose to put before the House this afternoon is, in substance, that which was recommended by the Committee on Immigration Appeals, under the chairmanship of Sir Roy Wilson, whose Report was published some time ago.
Basically, the system which the Government have adopted is in line with the recommendations which he and his Committee made. We are all greatly indebted to Sir Roy Wilson and his colleagues for their valuable work in laying the foundations of what is an important change in the administration in our immigration control. I believe that it is right to make this change, but it is an important one and I should like to take some time to describe what the difference is, so that the House will be clear about the consequences of what it is being asked to do.
The present position as the law stands is that the Home Secretary has the power to keep any alien out of the country and I also have power to exclude any Commonwealth citizen unless he can show that he has a statutory right of admission. In the exercise of these powers or, indeed, for my failure to exercise these powers in particular cases, I am answerable to

the House, and this responsibility is brought home to me at regular intervals, as well as to the junior Ministers in the Department and to the officials, by a continuing stream of correspondence from hon. Members, who, while they may be against immigration in general, nevertheless always find an exceptional case in which I should have allowed someone in whom I have refused and, not infrequently, by Questions and debates. This is part of the responsibility of hon. Members.
Under the proposed system, the final responsibility in the generality of cases will no longer rest with me. If an immigrant wishes to dispute a decision, his proper remedy under the Bill will be to exercise his right of appeal under the system which the Bill lays down. Nor will hon. Members always be able to hold me answerable if they think that a Commonwealth citizen or alien has been wrongly admitted or wrongly refused. The initiative on refusal of entry or deportation will still lie with the Home Office, but if the person concerned chooses to appeal it will be for the appellate authorities and not for myself to say whether that decision will stand.
The Wilson Committee has thought that this new provision would give a new sense of security and protection to the individual. For myself and the junior Ministers, and perhaps for hon. Members, it may mean a lightening of the burden which we carry, but certainly the Bill marks an important extension of the rule of law in this country. It will be of benefit to immigrants and also, in a sense, to the Home Office, because it will require it to make manifest the grounds on which decisions are taken about immigration control.
The Bill may help to remove much of the suspicion and misconception which now exists and which, in view of my personal experience, I am bound to say is usually unfounded. I find that this is so in relation to the manner in which the immigration officials and others deal with their cases, and indeed the Wilson Committee made this clear in its Report. However, the sense of security is as important as security itself, and if it makes for better relations between the Home Office and others, that is something gained.
Having mentioned the power which I shall lose under the Bill, I should make clear what powers I shall retain. First, in accordance with the Wilson Committee's recommendations, which I accept, the Home Office will remain responsible for determining the policy to be applied in the administration of immigration control. That policy is expressed in the form of "immigration rules", which will be laid before Parliament and published. As the House knows, the rules governing the admission of Commonwealth citizens have been published in a series of White Papers dating back to 1962. A draft of corresponding rules for aliens has been laid before Parliament along with the Bill.
Under the appeals system, these immigration rules will be binding on the appellate authorities and, within the limits allowed by law, I shall be free to alter them from time to time as, in my view, the public interest may require. I shall of course be answerable to Parliament for so doing or equally answerable for not altering them—

Mr. Ronald Bell: Where is the provision to be found in the Bill that the rules which the right hon. Gentleman makes under the 1962 Act will be binding on the appellate authority?

Mr. Callaghan: I am not sure at the moment which Clause it is, but I will get the hon. and learned Gentleman an answer to that.
Second, in security cases, I do not think it right to give up responsibility for the final decision in cases where the decision is taken on security grounds. In such cases there is to be a special advisory procedure which is set out in Clause 9. Third, although, in cases where entry is refused otherwise than on security grounds, the Home Secretary of the day will no longer be able to make his decision prevail, the Bill does enable him to secure that his decision cannot be overruled until the case has been heard by the Tribunal if he considers it desirable in the public interest that the higher appellate authority should decide on the matter.

Clause 1 establishes the appellate authorities, comprising the Immigration Appeal Tribunal and the adjudicators. Clauses 2 to 5 confer rights of appeal

against action taken under the Commonwealth Immigrants Act and Clause 13 enables provision for appeals in connection with the admission and removal of aliens to be made by Order in Council under the Aliens Restriction Acts. I have laid before the House a White Paper containing a draft Order in Council which shows the provision which we intend to make. That is Cmnd. 3833.

The reason for dealing with Commonwealth citizens and aliens in these two different ways is no doubt a question which hon. Members will want to ask, since it has been raised before. It is related to the different nature of the existing legislation which applies to each of these categories—statutes in the case of Commonwealth citizens and Orders in Council is the case of aliens.

The right hon. and learned Member for St. Marylebone (Mr. Hogg) has raised this question of having a substantive law and combining it all together, consolidating it at some stage. I can only say what I have said previously, that we shall have permanent and comprehensive legislation on the control of Commonwealth citizens and aliens which will also cover rights of appeal, but it was not within the powers of the draftsmen on this occasion, with the volume of legislation which the Home Office has had to carry this year and is carrying now, to make the very detailed and comprehensive provision for which the right hon. and learned Gentleman has asked.

We have not lost sight of this, but it simply has not been possible to find room for it on this occasion without overtaxing those concerned. In any case, if I may make a virtue of necessity, we may profit by seeing how the new appeals system works in practice, superimposed as it will be on the present system of control, before the two are embodied in permanent legislation. Meanwhile, there can be no question of aliens being arbitrarily deprived of the rights of appeal which it is intended to confer on them as set out in the draft Aliens (Appeals) Order, because any Order in Council amending that Order will itself be subject to the negative Resolution procedure.

The decisions against which Commonwealth citizens have rights of appeal under Clauses 2 to 5 of the Bill are, with one important exception, those against


which the Wilson Committee recommended that an appeal should lie. That is, they are appeals against exclusion under Clause 2 from the United Kingdom, appeals against conditions of admission under Clause 3, appeals against deportation orders under Clause 4 and appeals against directions for removal from the United Kingdom under Clause 5.

The exception which I am making to the Committee's recommendations is in the case of deportation following conviction for a criminal offence. Hon. Members may recall that my predecessor, announcing the Government's decisions on the Committee's Report, said that he thought it preferable to leave the courts with their present powers to recommend offenders for deportation and to provide for appeals against such recommendations to continue to be heard within the ordinary judicial system. In this way, we ensure that, where a Commonwealth immigrant or an alien offends against the ordinary criminal law, the question of deportation is considered in the first instance by the court which has heard at first hand evidence about the nature and circumstances of the offence and has taken into account whatever may be put forward by way of mitigation.

It seems to the Government that the offender against the ordinary criminal law receives full justice under the existing law and does not need any new right of appeal, except the limited right of appeal which is given by Clause 5 (3) on the question to what country he is to be deported.

It is my practice always to try to meet the expressed wishes of those who are being deported as to the countries to which they should go. It is not universally possible for this to happen and in future—although I have not had the experience of such a case—if someone wishes to appeal against a decision under Clause 5 (3) he will still have the right to do so. Where a court does recommend deportation I, and I have no doubt future Home Secretaries, will continue to consider most carefully all the relevant circumstances of the case before deciding whether to make a deportation order. That is the practice at present and I shall continue it.

On the question of illegal immigrants, in accordance with the Wilson Committee's recommendation a person who is alleged to have entered illegally is to have a right of appeal, but we have thought it desirable to make it clear that if he has entered, or is seeking to enter, illegally, his appeal must fail once the adjudicator is satisfied of this.

It is implicit in the Wilson Committee's Report that an appellant who has reached the United Kingdom and is refused entry on arrival should normally be allowed to remain here to await the determination of his appeal; and provision for that purpose is made in Schedule 2.

The Committee proposed, however that an exception should be made in the kind of case dealt with in paragraph 4 of Schedule 2, namely, where an appeal to an adjudicator against refusal of entry is dismissed, and the appellant—not being the holder of an entry certificate—wants to appeal to the Tribunal, but the adjudicator does not feel justified in granting leave to appeal. In those circumstances, the Wilson Committee recommended that the appellant should be liable to be removed from the country forthwith, but without prejudice to his right to make and pursue his application to the Tribunal from overseas.

The practical arguments in favour of the Committee's recommendation have prevailed not only with me, but also with the Council on Tribunals, which I have consulted on this and other points arising from the Committee's Report.

Mr Sydney Bidwell: Where is it proposed to house or otherwise accommodate immigrants or would-be immigrants who are awaiting their appeals, since at present they seem to find their way into Her Majesty's prisons? Is it proposed to alter the present arrangements?

Mr. Callaghan: That is an important matter to which I have been giving a lot of attention. My hon. Friend the Under-Secretary will be dealing with this point when he replies to the debate.

Mr. Eric Lubbock: Why not now?

Mr. Callaghan: We in the Department try to divide up the work that must be done in a workmanlike way. If the hon.


Member for Orpington (Mr. Lubbock) wishes to make any complaints during the debate I am sure that he will find that my hon. Friend is able to reply to any points he raises.
On this subject, I would only point out that, without the provision of a great deal of money for expenditure, it is not possible to make satisfactory provision for these people. I suggest that the hon. Gentleman makes any complaints which he wishes to make during his speech.

Mr. Lubbock: It is difficult for us to refer to this matter without knowing the Government's plans. Would not the right hon. Gentleman agree that it would be more sensible for him to announce his intentions now, so enabling hon. Members to comment on the subject during the debate?

Mr. Callaghan: It might help if I say briefly that it is proposed to look for some properties in the London area and that it is intended to try to make the conditions as easy as possible in this regard because this is an important matter. My hon. Friend the Under-Secretary has been conducting this work himself and I thought that it would be better if he gave an account directly to the House of what he has been able to do.
I do not pretend that everything is satisfactory, in view of the absence of money. There is a limitation on our financial resources in this connection and I shall have to deal with this matter later. What I have said does not mean that what I have been discussing can be made available for everybody who wishes to come to these islands while his case is being considered.
I have also thought it necessary, for practical reasons, to retain some freedom of action in the case of seamen and stowaways. Seamen have always stood in a rather different position from ordinary passengers in relation to immigration control; and it is noteworthy that in the United States—whose system of immigration appeals the Wilson Committee took in many ways as a model—seamen have no right of appeal against refusal of entry. The Committee nevertheless recommended, in paragraph 89 of its Report, that seamen should have such an appeal in this country, and the Bill follows its recommendation.
But we have had to take account of what the results might be of giving seamen a right to remain in this country pending the outcome of their appeals. A foreign ship, calling during the course of its voyage at a port in this country, might be held up for days while a member of its crew—particularly if it was a small crew—pursued a groundless claim to admission to the United Kingdom.
It is to avoid problems of this kind, and to avoid unwarranted difficulty for the masters and owners of ships whose crew members may seek to evade their obligations, that the Bill provides for the removal of seamen and stowaways who still have appeals pending. I must emphasise, however, that seamen and stowaways will be allowed to remain here for the hearing of their appeals whenever this is practicable. In particular, I give an assurance that a seaman or stowaway who appears to be making a bona fide claim to political asylum will not be removed until his appeal has been disposed of.

On the question of leave to appeal, in accordance with the Wilson Committee's recommendations, and subject to one exception—namely, in Clause 7(2)—I propose to provide in the rules that leave to appeal is normally to be required and that it is to be granted in any case which turns on a point of law or in which the appellant is making a bona fide claim to political asylum.

In cases involving national security it is desirable that the Home Secretary of the day should retain his responsibility for the final decision. It is essential that there should be provision in such cases for safeguarding evidence the disclosure of which could be harmful to the national interest. These objects are secured by Clause 9, which provides for such appeals to be heard, in an advisory capacity, by a panel of independent and judicially-minded people in whom the appellant can have confidence and whose advice will carry great weight. In making special provision for security cases we are following the pattern set by various international conventions and by the relevant directive of the European Economic Community.

Mr. Ben Whitaker: On this point of security, would my right hon. Friend tell us whether the decision


of this body will be binding on the Home Secretary? Will he give an assurance that this provision will be used only in cases where essential national security is involved, remembering that the phrase "in the national interest" could be used to exclude people of temporary unpopularity or minority views—perhaps scientologists or students—who may fall foul of a future Government?

Mr. Callaghan: I do not think that scientologists have been excluded from entering on the basis of national security. Indeed, a lot of them have been admitted. They would not, however, be allowed to enter to study Scientology here. In any event, I do not think that that particular example is relevant.
The answer to my hon. Friend's first point is "No". This committee will not be binding on me. It is a case in which I believe that it is right that the Home Secretary and the Government should reserve the decision to themselves. However, they will have the advice of those who have been charged with this task and will be able to weigh the considerations which have resulted in the advisory committee reaching its conclusion. In other words, I will have a second opinion to help me in this matter.
If, one day, my hon. Friend the Member for Hampstead (Mr. Whitaker) becomes Home Secretary, which is not at all impossible, I am sure that he will find, as I have, that much careful consideration is given to these matters. [Interruption.] Hon. Gentlemen opposite know that what I am saying is true. If they have another point in mind, I suggest that if my hon. Friend were to join them he would never have a chance of becoming Home Secretary. We have at least another 20 years of Labour government before us.

Mr. Quintin Hogg: Weeks rather than months or years.

Mr. Callaghan: I was saying that if one day my hon. Friend becomes Home Secretary he will find that a great deal of care is taken with all these cases. They weigh very heavily on us when decisions must be taken. One cannot remove executive decisions entirely from the Executive. We are tending to move in that direction in some ways. I am in favour of the; Executive taking executive decisions and not being so cluttered up that they are not able to do more than—

I once used this phrase in connection with myself—blow their nose without asking leave of someone. Certainly, in this restrictive field of cases I must keep the responsibility for myself and for my successors.

Clause 14 empowers the Home Secretary to make grants towards expenditure incurred by voluntary organisations in providing, for people who have rights of appeal under the Bill, advisory and welfare services of the kind described in Part VIII of the Wilson Committee's Report. The Committee saw the provision of such services as primarily a matter for voluntary action and, in considering the Committee's recommendations on this subject, we have proceeded in close consultation with existing voluntary bodies concerned with the welfare of immigrants.

Seven of these bodies joined together to form a working group under the chairmanship of Mr. Raymond Clarke, who was himself a member of the Wilson Committee. I am grateful to him for the work he did. Earlier this year the group produced a set of proposals for the establishment of a single, comprehensive Ports Advisory and Welfare Service controlled by a council representing all seven voluntary bodies but paid for wholly out of public funds. My reaction, based partly on grounds of cost—here I come to the point made by the hon. Member for Orpington earlier. The difficulty one has in these new services of watching expenditure is very marked. That may not always appear in the huge sums with which we are dealing, but I find it very difficult to get such jobs done as the House ideally would like to see them done.

I wondered whether it could be done more efficiently and economically by existing voluntary bodies each doing what was best suited to its special skills and interests and I have asked the group to consider this matter. My hon. Friend the Under-Secretary has discussed the whole question at length with the voluntary bodies concerned and they are still in favour of setting up a new organisation especially for the purpose. I am willing to be guided by their views if they raise the question again.

Having heard their views and having accepted the proposal made by the Clarke working group that a new organisation


should be set up, I accept that the organisation should be recognisably independent of Government control but, at the same time, the voluntary bodies concerned in setting up the new organisation will recognise that, in so far as it is financed from public funds, there must be adequate safeguards to ensure that this public money is spent for the objects that Parliament intended, and for which the Home Secretary will have to account and carry responsibility.

We must carry some responsibility in this, although no doubt great charges and cries about interference will be levelled against me, because where large sums of public money are involved it is unreasonable to demand that there should be no accountability at all. I shall shortly be inviting the seven bodies which formed the working group, if they accept the principles I have stated, to set up a joint committee to formulate detailed plans and discuss with the Home Office the scale of the service to be provided and the arrangements to be made for financial assistance from public funds. I have to inform the House that this provision of an advisory service on appeals and all the rest, which we shall have to go through, is an expensive operation.

I now come to Part II of the Bill, the deportation of Commonwealth citizens in breach of conditions for admission. The principal provision here is Clause 15, which empowers the Home Secretary to make a deportation order without a court recommendation against a Commonwealth citizen who fails to comply with his conditions of admission. I wish to make clear that this power of deportation applies only to those Commonwealth citizens who have been admitted subject to conditions which are still in force. These will be mainly visitors and students and their dependants. The power under Clause 15 could not be exercised against Commonwealth citizens who, as holders of employment vouchers or as dependants of voucher holders or otherwise, have been admitted unconditionally for settlement. This is so whether the dependants come with the voucher holder or subsequently.

This power was first proposed three-and-a-half years ago by the Government, but when the Government decided to set up the Wilson Committee we took the view that it would better to defer legislation

on this matter until the appeals procedure was in being and we could be sure that Parliament would regard it as satisfactory. So the power to deport for breach of conditions of admission will not be introduced until the appellate authorities are established and the right of appeal to them is available against a decision to deport. The Under-Secretary will be dealing with the question of how long it will take to set this up, but I can say now that to recruit the staff of additional immigration officers and appeal authorities and to get the accommodation at the ports, which is difficult, will take some months after the Bill becomes law, although we are making preparations.

The purpose of Clause 15 is to enable the Home Office to enforce conditions of admission without recourse to criminal proceedings. In the present state of the law, the only sanction we can use against a Commonwealth citizen who fails to observe a time limit attached to his stay or a restriction on his engaging in employment is to prosecute him for an offence under Section 4(1) of the Commonwealth Immigrants Act, 1962. This is a harsh and clumsy procedure for dealing with people, many of whom are not criminals in any accepted sense. What is needed, as we said in 1965, is a "speedy and effective power" to secure their repatriation without our having to invoke the sanctions of the criminal law. This is what the Clause provides.

Clauses 16 to 20 contain various supplementary provisions. The only provision to which I need draw attention is, I think, Clause 16(5), which enables a warrant to be issued authorising entry to premises for the purpose of arresting a person who is liable to detention in connection with the making of a deportation order under Clause 15. There is a similar provision in paragraph 9 (2) of Schedule 3 relating to the arrest of appellants who have been released on bail.

I think that I have covered the main provisions of the Bill which, I understand from past speeches by the right hon. and learned Member for St. Marylebone and others, is acceptable to both sides of the House—in detail. It may be capable of improvement during its passage, although a great deal of thought has been given to its preparation, and it is based largely—almost


wholly—on the recommendations of the Wilson Committee. Much of it will seem dry and technical and no doubt will be a delight to the lawyers. I speak with no disrespect to them. I am sure that the House will not lose sight of its relevance to the hopes and fears of ordinary people who come as immigrants or visitors to seek the hospitality of this country. I think that the Bill will enhance the reputation of the country for justice and fair dealing, and I commend it to the House.

Mr. Whitaker: Will my right hon. Friend say why proceedings are not brought within the scope of the Tribunals and Inquiries Act, as the Wilson Committee recommended in paragraph 149?

Mr. Callaghan: It is done under regulation. I think that the method which we propose is the best we can follow. I shall be happy to pursue that further in Committee.

4.9 p.m.

Mr. Quintin Hogg: I am sure that the House is grateful to the Secretary of State for his lucid explanation of the Bill. As he said towards the beginning of his speech, there cannot be any question of the Opposition's dividing against it. As he said, too, a number of my hon. Friends—and, I think, some of my right hon. Friends—have expressed themselves favourably to its principles. I have expressed myself favourably to its purposes, which is not quite the same thing, because I am much more critical of the Bill than I should like to be. Were it left to myself on a free vote, I should be inclined to vote against its Second Reading in its present form, not because of Part II or Part III, but solely because of my criticisms of Part I.
Although I recognise at once that the Bill fairly respresents and embodies the substantial recommendations of the Wilson Committee, to whose work I, on behalf of the Opposition, join the Secretary of State in paying tribute, I think that there are important objections to the principles of Part I which have not been adequately deployed. Some of them are technical, but I do not think that any of them are legalistic. I want to slate, if only for the record, what I think the principal objections are.
First, I do not share the view which was expressed by the Secretary of State

that an appellate procedure can be erected on a substantive law which is itself nonsensical. This is to put the cart before the horse. Even though the argument of pressure of Parliamentary time is always a powerful one, I think that the result is probably greater confusion than it is greater clarification. At a later stage of my remarks I shall seek to amplify this argument.
Secondly, and much more important, I do not like what the Secretary of State described very candidly at the beginning of his speech. I think that these proposals blur the vital distinction between disputed questions of fact and law, which are properly for appeal, either before the courts or before a constituted tribunal, and questions of policy, of which I think Parliament should retain control. As the Secretary of State very properly pointed out, the effect of passing Part I in its present form is not merely to divest the Secretary of State of his individual and somewhat arbitrary powers, which in itself I would not mind so much, as to deprive Parliament of the control of policy. I do not think that a tribunal, appellate or otherwise, is the proper authority to decide questions of policy which are embodied in the rather obscure phrase "discretion" which the tribunal can impose upon the Secretary of State, and therefore upon Parliament, without Parliament retaining control over it.
Thirdly—this is the least important, but still not an unimportant, part of my thinking—I have been, and still am, rather concerned about the proliferation of ad hoc courts and tribunals which modern legislation involves. It may be that our ordinary courts of law are to some extent inadequate. If so, let us reform them. If they are adequate and do not require reform, it is a poor use of manpower and of resources to proliferate ad hoc tribunals all over the legal shop. I would far prefer to see the magistrates courts of the Metropolis, for instance, with a magistrate perhaps sitting with two lay members, decide these questions de die in diem than to have assembled a sort of trencher-fed pack for the purpose and to provide yet another piece of tribunal legislation the manpower for which is not so easily come by as Parliament in its wisdom sometimes seems to think.
Moreover, the ordinary courts are subject to the general supervision of the High Court on matters of law and on matters of natural justice. Although I did not agree with the particular form in which the question was put, I sympathised with the idea underlying the question put at the end of the Secretary of State's speech by the hon. Member for Hampstead (Mr. Whitaker). I wonder whether, by creating these separate courts, because that is what they are are, administering a private law of their own, without adequate supervision from above, we are improving the general state of the law under which we live at present.
I return to the three objections which I have stated in summary form. First, I am appalled at the quagmire into which we have allowed our immigration law to fall. At the risk of being a little diffuse, I want to describe the foundation upon which this appellate procedure is being built, because it is a foundation of the most uncertain and unsatisfactory kind.
Until 1905, the legal authorities were in radical dispute with one another as to whether an alien had a right to come to Britain, such legal pundits as Black-stone and Dicey being in irreconcilable conflict. Which was right is now an academic question, because what is certain is that throughout the 19th century, although aliens could be made to register under an Act of William IV, they could not be stopped, or at any rate were not stopped in practice, at the ports. It was not until 1905 that the Russian Imperial pogroms and other events on the Continent of Europe and elsewhere led to a demand for some kind of aliens legislation in Britain of an up-to-date kind.
The Aliens Act, 1905 gave for the first time a statutory but qualified right of immigration to aliens. They could land, but only at a certain number of designated ports. There was set up an appeals procedure from immigration officer to local tribunals not particularly unlike that which is being set up by the Bill.
This all came to an end in 1914, when we took smartly two steps backwards.

because as part of the emergency legislation we gave the Government of the day absolute discretion, which they exercised and have exercised ever since until today, by taking away from aliens any right of either landing here or remaining here except by favour of the Secretary of State of the day. In other words, we established one of the least liberal and one of the most arbitrary systems of immigration law in the world—in the civilised world, at any rate.
This may have been all right as part of the legislation passed on the night of 5th August, 1914, but the situation was rendered much more serious by the fact that in 1919 we continued the Act, which was originally limited to the emergency, for periods of one year; and we have been continuing it in the Schedule to the Expiring Laws Continuance Act ever since. This is at the root of the unacceptable situation which we are facing today.
That situation is not basically improved by creating an appeals procedure. What is wanted is the creation of a rational and comprehensive piece of legislation, because if, as two members of the Court of Appeal said in a recent case, an alien has no right whatever in law to be here or to enter here which he can test, there seems to be very little basis upon which the appeals procedure can operate on any judicial or juridical foundation.
Side by side with one of the most illiberal and arbitrary codes in the world dealing with alien immigration we have then proceeded to erect one of the most legalistic and rigid codes in relation to Commonwealth citizens. In 1948, by the British Nationality Act of that year, we created what, to my mind, is the fiction that the citizen of an independent Commonwealth country, once he is here, is a British subject; and in 1962 we restricted his right of entry, which hitherto had been an unqualified right. By the Commonwealth Immigrants Act of that year, we erected a fairly formidable fence over which he must get so as to get here at all; but secured that once he gets here he is virtually free after a short period of almost all restrictions.
The more I reflect upon it, the more convinced I am that part of the difficulty with which the House has been grappling


for the best part of 10 years in relation to Commonwealth immigration stems from the fact that a separate and more complicated law applies to them which gives them a qualified right of entry but an unqualified right to remain.
As though that were not enough, we have now created two more anomalies. Among those who are still citizens of the United Kingdom and Colonies and who had until 1962 an unqualified right of entry, we have created two separate classes—those whose perfectly British passports are issued by a Colonial Governor and those whose British passports are issued by a High Commissioner, the latter being subject to the Act of 1968 and the former being subject to the Act of 1962.
The situation now is that upon a legislative jungle we are seeking to superimpose a court of appeal without any indication that the court will have any real guide, in spite of the Home Secretary's instructions to immigration officers and his claims to continue to dictate policy by some kind of published ukase of his own, without any real guarantee that the court of appeal will be able to explore its way through the jungle by any system of rational or judicial determination.
That is what I wanted to say about my first objection. Surely, we ought as a matter of priority to establish a rational and comprehensive code repealing the laws which are now in force and codifying them according to a single and intelligible system, instead of superimposing an appellate system on what ultimately can only be described as a legal quagmire.
Secondly, I feel tremendous doubts about the wisdom of blurring the distinction between disputed questions of fact and law and questions of policy. I can understand that an appellate tribunal, be it ad hoc or one of the ordinary courts of the land, can decide disputed questions of fact. For instance, under the Commonwealth Immigrants Act, 1962, a child under a certain age of a Commonwealth Immigrant has a statutory right of entry into this country. If it be a question whether a particular individual is above or below the threshold age, or whether he bears or does not bear a blood relationship to the parent or the putative

parent whom he is seeking to join, this is something which can be investigated either by judicial means or by extra judicial means.
Equally, the meaning of the Act can be decided by a judicial or quasi-judicial process. But when in the end the question arises as to whether we shall admit, for instance, a scientologist to study at East Grinstead or a well-known American agitator to study at the London School of Economics, it seems to me that there are no principles upon which a judicial tribunal or quasi-judicial tribunal can come to a rational decision.
Hitherto, the Home Secretary has been responsible. We all love him, but he may make his mistakes and we can get at him here. We can say "This is right" and "This is wrong." But if he now divests himself of his responsibility for questions of policy, whether he divests himself in favour of an appellate tribunal which is wiser than he or less wise than he, we lose any kind of control over the situation at all. We lose control over the situation in a field precisely in which Parliament, at least in my judgment, ought to remain supreme.
I cannot, therefore, for this reason, share the enthusiasm of some of my hon. Friends, and certainly of the Home Secretary, for the Wilson proposals. It seems to me to raise a constitutional issue of considerable importance and a constitutional issue in which, despite the fact that I recognise myself to be in a minority, I cannot in this instance believe that I am mistaken.
Thirdly, I am deeply concerned about the mess that the law is getting into as a result of our method of piecemeal legislation. One of the examples—

Mr. Lubbock: Before the right hon. and learned Gentleman leaves his previous point, could he explain, as the Home Secretary did not do so, what will be the position of scientologists after the Bill has become law? Do the regulations made by the Government, binding immigration officials, remain in force, or can scientologists go to the tribunal and ask for a hearing to show reasons why they should be admitted?

Mr. Hogg: I must be careful about this because, as the hon. Member probably knows, I was professionally engaged in


the courts in a matter affecting it. My reading of the Bill is that they will be subject to the tribunal procedure, but I would rather the Under-Secretary gave the hon. Gentleman a definitive reply.
The point to which I was coming is this. Our piecemeal method of legislation was all right so long as we passed legislation in a relatively restricted form and on a relatively restricted number of occasions. But the law in my lifetime has become inconceivably more difficult to understand, or even to ascertain, than it was when I first became a member of my profession 35 years ago. One part at least which renders it particularly puzzling is that 35 years ago it was generally supposed that the proper use of judicial and legal manpower was to concentrate the administration of justice on a single set of courts, or, at any rate, on a single system of courts applying the general law, and since the war we have more and more been developing individual tribunals applying particular branches of law.
The reasons for this probably lie outside the ambit of the present discussion. But perhaps I might be allowed to say, in passing, that at any rate one reason, in my judgment, has been the abolition of the civil jury. The result has been that the public are vaguely aware that a single lawyer, sitting alone, is not always the ideal tribunal to try questions of fact, and sometimes not the ideal tribunal to administer social questions.
Instead of providing, as continental systems almost invariably do, that in such case he should be assisted by lay members, they have provided that in particularly sensitive subjects, be it immigration, be it rents, or be it a variety of different subjects, the ordinary courts should not try the issue, but a special court, composed more or less on the continental model, should be instituted to administer a separate branch of the law by itself. This is very wasteful of legal manpower because such tribunals normally have to have a legal chairman, and it is also very puzzling to the practitioner who needs to advise upon a coherent and intelligible system of jurisprudence.
Now we have done it again, and I wonder whether we have been wise to do

so. When I look at the Bill, I recognise that Parliament will pass it. Many of my hon. Friends have asked for it. Many of my hon. Friends, and, I think, hon. Members below the Gangway opposite, have thought that it represents an advance towards liberalism, or at least towards liberality. The Home Secretary, whose principles in the matter are quite impeccable, has commended it to the House. There can be no question of an official Division, but, finding myself in a minority, and not wishing to detain the House unduly by imposing my opinions on it, I am still entitled, I hope, to express my doubts.

4.32 p.m.

Mr. Gordon Cakes: I think that both sides of the House welcome the Bill, but we should have some regard to what has just been said by the right hon. and learned Member for St. Marylebone (Mr. Hogg), particularly towards the end of his speech. His reputation on legal matters and his reputation for a fearless defence of the principles of humanity, particularly with regard to race, have the respect of people inside and outside the House. In the Bill, we are dealing with some of the things he said.
I welcome the Bill—I think more warmly than the right hon. and learned Gentleman does—and congratulate my right hon. Friend the Home Secretary on dealing so comparatively quickly with the Committee's Report. The Committee was set up in February, 1966, and reported at the end of August, 1967, a little too late to get legislation in for the last Session of Parliament. It is important legislation, as the right hon. and learned Gentleman has said, from a constitutional point of view, and I am very glad that he emphasised this.
Hitherto, entry into this country has been regarded purely as a privilege. Today the House has the courage to say that entry for an alien shall be a right, and that since it is a right there shall be appeal against refusal of entry by a civil servant. It is progress that the Home Secretary is to devolve from himself some responsibility for these matters, so I do not go along with the right hon. and learned Gentleman in that regard. I commend my right hon. Friend for what he has done.
It is astonishing that for so many years we have had no right of appeal in the matter. There was a system of appeal between 1905 and 1914 when the need for it was small. The number of Empire citizens or aliens coming to our shores, whether as visitors or to settle, was far smaller. But, as a result of a wartime emergency Measure in 1914, the system of appeal disappeared. That emergency legislation has been like a great millstone round our necks for 55 years, until the introduction of the Bill. We should pay more regard to this when we pass emergency temporary Acts to meet a particular situation.
It is very important that we have a system of appeal, and that justice is seen to be done, because of our status as a nation. We hear a great deal today about Britain's prestige in the world, whether it is said to be declining or whatever else may be happening to it, but our prestige as a nation that believes in the rule of law and justice for all its citizens is still unchallenged throughout the world. Yet the very point where a Commonwealth citizen or alien sets foot on our shores has for 55 years been the point where the rules of justice have not applied, where he has had to be subject to an arbitrary decision by a civil servant with no right of appeal. That happens just when he has arrived at the place that he and his countrymen have been taught to regard as the mother of freedom and justice.
We should warmly welcome steps which put that matter right from the point of view of the prestige of justice in this country and to our standing throughout the world as a nation that believes in the rights of citizens against the State and against authority, the right of any citizen or alien—indeed, any person—to appeal to the rules of justice if a decision is made against him.
We should remember, too, that this is a very human problem. Basically, we shall be talking law in our consideration of the Bill, but it deals with a very human matter. Since it has been before the House I have had occasion to wish that its previsions were in force. The day after Boxing Day a boy called Mahmud Tai arrived in this country from India. I think that he was 12 years old. I received a telephone call at my office

from an Indian lawyer in London asking me to intervene with the Home Secretary so that the boy was not sent back on the first available plane. He came to this country because his parents were dead and he had no relatives who could look after him in India. He has a sister married to an Indian who lives in my constituency.
I immediately telephoned my hon. Friend the Under-Secretary of State, and the Home Office acted with characteristic speed and humanity so that the boy could stay until his credentials were checked. They were found to be in order. His parents were dead and he was telling the truth. His documents were correct, and there was no fraud. He was allowed to stay, and this morning I received a letter from his grateful sister and her husband thanking me for the action I had taken.
But suppose that he had not been a child, and that there had been no one to advise him to get in touch with the lawyer in London. Suppose that I had been elsewhere and had been unable to take that telephone call. All those things could have happened, and that boy would have been put on the plane back to India, while the only relatives who can take care of him are in my constituency.
The Bill can prevent that sort of thing happening. It is bad enough that a boy of that age was detained at the airport from 27th December to 16th January, a little boy far from his home waiting to get to his relatives. But at least now there is a system that will enable all Commonwealth citizens and aliens in that predicament to appeal. The right of a person to be bailed while he is waiting for his appeal to be heard is not there at present.
I emphasise this case not just because it is a constituency case, but so that the House can get into perspective what is happening, so that we do not sit here for the whole of the debate today, and the whole of Committee stage, dealing with legal matters. We will be dealing with legal matters undoubtedly. We have to remember, on the other side of the coin, that there are people like this little boy, bewildered people, who have come to this country and who have hitherto had no hope of appeal against an immigration officer's decision.
The right hon. and learned Member for St. Marylebone asked whether the system of appeal is right, and whether we should not use the existing courts. I find this an attractive idea, but the Wilson Committee is basically right because this is a peculiar problem which probably the ordinary courts would find difficult to handle. This is first of all because of the urgency. It is not easy to get magistrates together, or to get a stipendiary magistrate, when an aeroplane is coming in and quick decisions have to be taken.
A court may have a long list of criminal matters before it. The ordinary magistrates' courts are already overloaded and they would have to act with very great speed when an immigrant enters the country. Secondly, these matters require a very high degree of expertise. They are problems unto themselves. A lot of internal case matters will come up on them, and the courts concerned with the appeal will have to know this specialised part of the law intimately. I do not think that one could expect ordinary magistrates, or even a stipendiary magistrate, thoroughly to master this.
Despite what I have said about looking at this from the human angle, we must remember that this is a Bill more about the law than about immigrants. It deals with appeals. We should not bury our heads in the sand and forget this. We should look at it from that point of view from now on.
There are two pillars in the system, the tribunals and the adjudicators. I have very few complaints about the tribunal set-up except for the complaint voiced by my hon. Friend the Member for Hampstead (Mr. Whitaker) and echoed by the right hon. and learned Member, about these tribunals coming within the Tribunals and Inquiries Act, 1958. Wilson recommends this in paragraph 149 in no uncertain terms. The Report says:
We consider it desirable that the appellate authorites should be brought within the scope of the Tribunals and Inquiries Act, 1958. This can be done by an order under section 10 of the Act adding them to the list of tribunals contained in Schedule 1.
It is important that that takes place. We must continuously review the activities of tribunals, otherwise we could

have, as the right hon. and learned Gentleman said, a separate system of law accountable to no one; unaccountable to the High Court and unaccountable to the House. I hope that the Under-Secretary will deal with this matter.
When we come to the adjudicators, we have to go more carefully. There will only be 24, as far as I can see. It will be on the quality of the adjudicators that this law will stand or fall. It will be on their ability and quality that it will rest. If we get the right men, the Bill can be a tremendous help and success. If we get the wrong men, we will end up in a muddle which will harm Parliament, the law, the immigrant and our country. These adjudicators are judicial officers, not administrators, not executive officers.
They are dealing with highly technical, legal rules and regulations. They are sitting alone as a court. They have to hear both sides and apply the rules of natural justice. They have to know the law of evidence, they have to try the case between the official of the Home Office and the appellant immigrant. All those are strictly judicial functions. These adjudicators have the right to grant bail. We are very careful when dealing with the liberty of the subject. We have to be very careful to whom we give the power to restrict that liberty. These adjudicators will have that power, which is again a judicial power.
The adjudicators will be in the privileged position, that we normally accord only to very senior judges, of being able to decide whether the appellant has the right to appeal against his decision to the Tribunal. That is a very privileged position for anyone, and it is a purely judicial position. Having regard to all those factors, I ask the Under-Secretary to deal with this question carefully and to think deeply about the type of qualifications he will be requiring for these people.
It is a tremendous responsibility for one man, sitting alone as a court—constituting a court in himself in the vast majority of cases. Because it is a judicial office, the first question I ask is whether it is right that the appointment of the adjudicators should be by the Home sSecretary. I would much prefer that the Lord Chancellor appointed these 24 people.
Let us take the analogy, and it is a fair one, of the Metropolitan courts. Stipendiary magistrates are appointed by the Lord Chancellor. It would be very difficult if the Home Secretary were to appoint them, because the Home Secretary is also responsible for the Metropolitan Police. In this country we do not like the system where one body appoints both the judge and the accuser. In the case of immigrants, the Home Office is the accuser; it will be the prosecutor in many cases—or may well be. Therefore, it is far better that the Lord Chancellor should appoint these adjudicators, in the same way as he will be the person responsible for appointing the tribunals.
I want to deal with the rumours we have heard, through correspondence from various bodies, that immigration officers, or ex-immigration officers, will be appointed to these jobs. I do not think that that should be the case. Again, justice must be seen to be done, and this is a very judicial office. I am a practising solicitor, and I do not want to be accused of coming to the House and asking for jobs for the boys, but we should have the boys for the jobs. If one is to give a man such judicial powers, he should be a qualified barrister or solicitor.
The Wilson Report, dealing not with the permanent adjudicators, but part-time adjudicators, suggests that it ought to be solicitors doing this work. It is very fair to make this point, because a qualified lawyer is used to dealing with questions of natural justice, with the rules of evidence, and applying his mind fairly to both sides of the case.
I turn to deal with the legal aspect of representation before these tribunals. Clause 14 deals with grants to organisations or to the body of joint organisations that will be looking after the welfare and advice of immigrants who find themselves in difficulties at the airport. Clause 11(2)(c) deals with the rules
… enabling any party to be represented before an appellate authority by any person, whether having professional qualifications or not.
I am not sure that this is a wise provision because it means that a rich alien or Commonwealth citizen who comes here gets the advantage of a barrister

or solicitor before the Tribunal, whereas the poor alien or Commonwealth citizen may not be able to have that advantage because legal aid is not being extended to cases before either the Tribunal or the adjudicators. It is a pity that legal aid has not been so extended, because it may well be imperative that a professional, legally-qualified person, who has obligations to his client by nature of his profession, should appear on behalf of the applicant in this country before either a tribunal or an adjudicator.
These are some minor criticisms of the Bill, but I echo a little of the concern about a separate body of legal non-law, as it were, being set up by this appeals system. But, basically, I think that we can be proud that, as a nation, we have had the courage, after 55 years, to stop repeating the annual performance we have had in this House of readopting the 1919 Act. We are saying, instead, that aliens and Commonwealth citizens coming here have rights, and that, if an immigration officer—a civil servant—disputes those rights, they appeal to someone. The House, the Government and the nation can be proud of this Bill.

4.52 p.m.

Mr. W. F. Deedes: I am sorry that, unlike the hon. Member for Bolton, West (Mr. Oakes), I am unable to welcome the Bill very warmly. I feel much about it as my right hon. Friend the Member for St. Marylebone (Mr. Hogg) feels. I am not clear why we of the Opposition are not voting against it, but I will advance my own reasons for seeing its prospective difficulties.
I understand why the Home Secretary has brought it forward. None the less, I have—and I suspect that he has—many misgivings as to how it will work in practice. The hon. Gentleman has stressed what the Home Secretary stated—that the Bill gives the right impression. It appears to do justice where it was feared that injustice was done before. I only hope that it ends up by giving that impression. I fear that it is more likely that the Bill will tend to create a legal battleground at our principal ports between those who want a more liberal immigration policy and those whose job it is to carry out its instructions. It may not happen, but under the Bill it could.
As my right hon. and learned Friend eloquently said, we are plainly trying to put an administrative function by the immigration service, under the Home Office, and—to an even greater extent—political functions by ourselves into a judicial framework. That is bound to lead to difficulties. It is made all the more difficult because the Bill fails to meet one of our most urgent requirements, with which the Wilson Report dealt at some length. This is a more efficient system for determining whether those who seek admission here have a right to it.
The Bill devises fresh ways of dealing with doubtful cases but does nothing to reduce the number of doubtful cases which will arise. As the Report made clear in paragraphs 20 and 63, one cannot hope to achieve this at port of entry. A system which bases immigration control principally on examination at ports of entry is bound to have drawbacks; it is bound to create doubtful cases and—most serious—to leave loopholes.
The Bill does not reduce the drawbacks, but makes their handling more elaborate by imposing a two-tier system—inevitably elaborate and expensive—which may have to handle between 15,000 and 20,000 appeals on all counts on top of the load already at the ports. It certainly provides safeguards against the few mistakes made by immigration control which are adverse to the immigrants. But I must observe that it adds no safeguards, except by giving the Home Secretary the ultimate sanction of deportation, against abuse of regulations by immigrants.
It is true that the Wilson Committee did not recommend the compulsory introduction of the entry certificate. It came out against that, but it stressed the value of the entry certificate as a means of reducing doubt. As figures have shown, it would reduce doubt and also the burden of proof at the ports—and it is from this situation that all our principal difficulties here arise.
The Wilson Committee then recommended that, short of compulsion, we should use every possible step, in consultation with the Commonwealth, to increase the use of entry certificates above a figure which was then given—about one immigrant in five. If that figure has

changed, perhaps we can be told. It is fair to ask, because it is central to what we are trying to do, what the Government are doing about this matter. Have we done anything since the Report to shift the burden of proof from ports of entry to administration in the country of origin? If not, why not? The Wilson Committee thought this a very important step.
A word is due about the immense load of responsibility being borne by the immigration service under the present system. Some people have interpreted the Bill as, in a sense, a vote of no confidence in the immigration service. That is erroneous. I was glad that the right hon. Gentleman expressed his confidence in the immigration service when he said that much of the suspicion which had arisen in respect of certain cases was unfounded. I have lately visited, through the courtesy of the Home Office, a number of ports. The Channel ports, which have entry from Europe, have problems different from those which a number of us have seen at airports such as Heathrow.
I am left in no doubt as to the lengths which an appreciable minority will go, backed and increasingly supported by organisations in their own country, to secure entry here illicitly. This is one of our handicaps. Organisations and agencies exist to assist the entry of illicit immigrants and they are working, in a sense, at the point of departure whereas our own organisation starts almost entirely at the point of arrival; and very often at certain times and during certain months when immigrants know very well that there is immense pressure and distraction and that the chances of entry are strongest.
There therefore remain many loopholes which the immigration service has to compete with and must continue to do so notwithstanding the system established by the Bill and against which the Bill is irrelevant. It is important to strike a sense of balance as between the injustice done to very few and the larger injustice done by those who secure illicit entry.
I must, therefore, go on to mention some of the practical difficulties which now arise and which adjudicators and, eventually, the Tribunal, will have to deal with. The most obvious problem


the immigration service gets is that of a Commonwealth visitor who comes ostensibly on holiday, with funds and a sponsor and even, perhaps, with a return ticket to somewhere in Europe.
The chances are that on that evidence he must be admitted, and then he may well settle. I do not see how an arbitrator, or even a tribunal, would be able to reach a different conclusion. It is here that conditions imposed which are now, I think mistakenly, to be subject to appeal are important, even though our means of enforcing conditions of them are somewhat tenuous. Where a visitor causes doubt on immigration, the conditions of entry involve landing and embarkation cards.
When the Under-Secretary replies, I wonder whether he could tell us the number, in the last convenient period, of landing and embarkation cards used when conditions were imposed, how many were coupled up, how many were not coupled up and how many in this last category were ever traced. There is a problem here which none of the arrangements in the Bill will do much to resolve.
Again, immigration officers have to deal with the man who comes to this country and declares that he is a returning resident. He may have a forged stamp in his passport, he may have no passport at all, but if he is, and he can prove that he is, already resident here, he must be admitted. What he may have done, however, is to dispose of his passport somewhere in Europe, where it will be remade and later used to bring in an illegal immigrant to this country.
The Wilson Report stated that, in 1956, 150 doctored passports were traced by immigration officers. It would be interesting to know whether the figure is available for 1967 and 1968. How many doctored passports were not traced, we shall never know. In all this I am not seeking to suggest that the immigration officers are not doing their job. That would be quite the reverse of truth. But if we set up this system of appeals, we ought to be aware of the sort of case which will come before the arbitrator. We should then ask ourselves what sort of decision we as arbitrators would reach in cases of that kind.
Again, we have the influx of fiancées, which will be a difficult matter to deal

with on appeal. It is something to which I drew attention about a year ago. I do not want to detain the House by going into the figures, but those which I have are suggestive. As I calculate, the number of fiancées entering from India alone during the past 12 months—this is a rough guess—could be about 2,000 or 2,500. There may be an explanation for the figures which I have worked out. The Under-Secretary knows roughly how they are tabulated, and if there is such an explanation perhaps he will give it to us. Otherwise, I find it disturbing to accept that up to 2,500 may have come under this category compared with 3,900 vouchers given in ail to the same country. That requires close scrutiny. We will not solve this problem by setting up an arbitrator or Tribunal for cases of appeal.
I mention all this because I am sure that this point bears pressing. Responsibility for a tough policy at the ports lies not on the Home Office, the Secretary of State, or the immigration service. It lies largely on the minority whose tactics, about which I could say a good deal, compel the immigration officers to be suspicious and strict. I have seen a great deal of the immigration officers. They are not looking under the bed for illegal immigrants. What they are doing is to uncover a very great number from day to day and week to week, in accordance with our instructions.
These realities raise particular difficulties concerning one or two of the proposals in the Bill—for example, those who will appeal and then offer recognizances or are granted bail. Twenty-four hours may elapse between the detention of someone who is alleged to be entering illegally and the hearing of an appeal before an arbitrator. During that period, the immigrants in question must either be incarcerated, in a manner which, I hope, the Under-Secretary will describe, or released on bail. Bail offers considerable difficulty, because the forfeiture of, say, £50 or £100 will be accepted by some as a fair price of entry. It is true that the Home Office will have power to deport those who may jump their bail, but they must first be caught and experience shows that that is not always easy.
I mention one other practical difficulty concerning the appeals. Whether they


come before the arbitrator or the Tribunal, hearings will normally be held openly and the immigration service, I understand, will be represented by an appeals officer. Where there has been fraud or forgery, he will have to declare the method of detection; he will have to satisfy the arbitrator about what has happened and how the immigrant was detected.
It is undesirable that certain safeguards which are now being employed in connection with passports and entry certificates should be disclosed in open court. Clause 9 of the Bill should be wide enough to cover cases of that kind. It is most undesirable that we should disclose methods which are used by the Home Office and the immigration service.
Further, we are likely to find that language creates difficulties. It will do so far more for the arbitrators than for the immigration officers, most of whom are skilled in one or more language. Thus, interpreters will be key figures at all the appeals. On how they translate will often depend the impression which the arbitrator gets of the bona fides of an appellant. A great deal may hang on an honest translation. I hope that these interpreters will be very well paid and safeguarded from pressure. That will be very important.
We must recognise, however reluctantly, that the immigration service, on our behalf, is engaged, under instructions for which we are responsible, in a battle of wits. The Bill recognises that injustice is done when admission is unjustly refused, but it is also done when admission is won unlawfully. The Wilson Committee was explicit on this in paragraph 59 of its Report. Ultimately, it leads to the proliferation of controls, from which the prospective immigrant suffers. Therefore, to remedy injustice we must in logic seek to reduce the numbers in both these categories. This the Bill fails to do.
My impression is that the job of the immigration officers gets harder all the time. It is fair to disclose, as the Under-Secretary knows, that in one country, which I will not name, it is now possible to take a course on how to count English money, how to describe an English journey and pass a great many

other tests associated with immigration. All this is part of the price of the ticket. The individual is, perhaps, less blameworthy than the agencies which make these arrangements. That is the reality of what the immigration service is confronted with.
All things considered, we are pretty well served by these officers and I regret any step which may be interpreted as devaluing their services. Most of them have had long experience and their decisions are based principally on experience and not on knowledge of the law. I am doubtful whether the appointment of the arbitrators, however good they are, and I understand that they may be paid nearly double what the immigration officers get, initially without experience but with knowledge of the law, will, overall, secure a fairer result for the immigrant or the alien or be a whit less arbitrary.

5.10 p.m.

Mr. Sydney Bidwell: During my nearly three years of membership of this House I do not think I have ever missed a speech by the right hon. and learned Gentleman the Member for St. Marylebone (Mr. Hogg) on the question of immigration, race relations and all the attendant difficulties. I have followed with close attention the thread of his argument through those speeches, and I followed him with very close attention today. I was a little surprised, therefore, to find that he is only lukewarm towards the Bill before the House this afternoon. He went so far as to say that, although he could not speak for hon. and right hon. Members behind him, he had an inclination to vote against the Bill because of the disquiet which he felt. He went on to attempt to explain the reasons for that disquiet. I hope that my words are drawn to his attention.
I was tempted to interject when he was speaking, because I thought that some of the vein of his argument tended to suggest we ought to have a discriminatory system at one stage between immigrants and would-be immigrants from the old Commonwealth and immigrants or would-be immigrants from the new Commonwealth. His argument tended to say that we have to bring the whole concept of alien immigration in line with what we may have afoot for Commonwealth immigration. There may be an argument


for that, but, although in matters of law I am an amateur compared with him—although not on other matters which we are now considering—I suggest to him that we cannot lift this matter of jurisprudence out of the consideration of historial circumstances and of what went on in London a week ago, namely, the Commonwealth Conference.
This is what we are bequeathed by history, and at this stage of events we inevitably have to approach the matter in the way we are in fact approaching it. We are learning the whole of the time. There is no last word on this. In the Select Committee on Race Relations we are hard at work and taking the matter very seriously, and we are going to visit places to see the practicalities of the matter at first hand. I would suggest to the right hon. and learned Gentleman that he has to consider these broader concepts and aspects of the matter. I may say, too, in deference to him, after listening to his explanations of the necessity of not having ad hoc arrangements all over the place, as he puts it, that I am very much inclined towards his way of thinking, more so than I have been hitherto.
What we are doing today is a very right and proper thing to do. One cannot look at the matter in narrow compartments. We have to set it against the whole national discussion which is going on the whole of the time about immigrants and the attendant problems of race relations in this country. Still thinking, just for the moment, at any rate, of the right hon. and learned Gentleman, I would recall that when we first set out on the consideration of the other measures he wanted to broaden them; he wanted a bill of rights for sex, religion, language. We have argued about it. What kind of morass would we now have if we were getting up appeals machinery on the question of sex discrimination and so on? We would be in very serious difficulties.
Coming back to the Bill, I think we are doing a very wise thing. There are philosophical considerations and there are practical considerations. I have had a continous interest in the matter of immigrants. With the last Act we now have it that a dependant child cannot join a single parent unless he or she is divorced or there is an estrangement. There is that to be proved. We say a dependant relative cannot join his offspring

unless he is over 65 or unless she is over 65. That needs to be proved. It is certainly no easy matter to prove when dependant relatives are coming from countries where there is no birth certification.
I would rather echo some of the remarks by the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Ashford (Mr. Deedes), that we need to look much more closely at the matter of entry certification and some proof of origin. I have been personally involved in these matters and have been through heartrending experiences—and they are heartrending experiences. It does not matter whether the people are Indians or Pakistanis or West Indians, they all matter to me equally when they are engaged in this kind of battle to achieve family unity in this country. I asked earlier, in an interjection during my right hon. Friend's speech, where it was proposed to put such people while under dispute. No doubt my hon. Friend I he Under-Secretary will elaborate on this a little when he replies to this debate, because some of these people with whose cases I have been involved have landed up in Wormwood Scrubs, and some others in Brixton Prison. From close inquiries I have made I understand that they have been accorded very decent treatment, but any step we make away from considering them solely as criminals is welcome indeed, and I note the remarks in this regard of my right hon. Friend.
I turn again to the desirability of proving birth before leaving country of origin. We have had cases where young people have been sent to hospital to have their bones examined, because it is said by the medical authorities that one can deduce the age of a young person within a reasonable amount of time, but I am told that at the other end of the scale of proving a man's age it is not possible to determine his age exactly within a span of about 10 years. That may be a consolation to some of us who pass ourselves off as younger than we are! But this is a medical fact and it makes things exceedingly difficult.
I was a little disquieted last year at the outburst of a proclamation by a group of immigration officers, but I have regard to the most difficult job they are undertaking, and I want to make it easier—and not only for them but for myself; and not the least part of my


welcome for this Bill is my hope that in consequence of it I shall not get so much involved in the individual cases as they arise from time to time, although one concedes that there may be occasions when Members of Parliament, even with the Bill, will be disposed to step in in what they think may be a case of injustice and a case for re-examination, and so on.
I have read criticisms of the Bill, criticisms by such bodies as the National Council for Civil Liberties. I have read some of the criticisms advanced by voluntary bodies concerned with the welfare of immigrants. There is a measure of validity in some of these criticisms, but they are matters best debated in the close confines of the Committee. The Home Secretary has explained that his mind is not shut to the possibility of using people with considerable experience of this kind; it is a matter of arranging the tidiest set-up we can get. The Bill is not a perfect Bill; it will not be a perfect Bill after it has been through Committee; but it is a necessary step forward and, for that reason, I warmly welcome it.

5.20 p.m.

Mr. Philip Goodhart: My right hon. and learned Friend the Member for St. Marylebone (Mr. Hogg) and the hon. Member for Bolton, West (Mr. Oakes) have said that, for the last 55 years, we have, in theory, had one of the most illiberal systems for regulating the entry of aliens and for the control of aliens once they were here of any civilised part of the world. As the son of a man who came here as an alien and who is, indeed, still an alien, I should perhaps say that, in practice, the law has been administered as humanely as in any part of the civilised world, and it is practice that matters as much as theory.
The hon. Member for Southall (Mr. Bidwell), like so many hon. Members, has assumed that the Bill will, in practice, have liberal repercussions but, like so much of the legislation introduced by this Government, I expect that the Bill will have practical results that will take the Government by surprise. When one considers the large number of people involved in Commonwealth entry and the importance of the issues, there has been remarkably little criticism of the immigration officers, remarkably few assertions

that they have been too severe in the performance of their duties. We all know that there are in this country and abroad many people and organisations who are anxious to discredit our whole structure of immigration control. It is astonishing how few cases can be brought to light in which people have been wrongly sent back to their place of origin.
At the same time, it is probable that many people get into this country who ought not to be admitted, and that our immigration officers have, in the last few years, almost over-balanced in their efforts to be lenient. Those immigration officials whom I have met are humane as well as efficient men. The fact that there has been, as we all know, a substantial measure of evasion is no criticism of their efficiency as individuals, but it is a criticism of the system that they have to work.
I think that all hon. Members present have been to see the system working at London Airport. When a number of planes arrive at the same time and there are long queues at the immigration desk, quite clearly each individual cannot receive an adequate check of his credentials without bringing the whole system and the whole airport to a grinding halt, and many people in the past who, perhaps, should have received rather closer checking have gone through.
With the introduction of this system of appeal, it may well be that immigration officers will feel that they no longer have to take full responsibility for sending back would-be immigrants and can be more stringent in their interpretation of the law and refer to the adjudicators far more cases than might be expected from the number of people who have been refused permission to land in past years.
If we are ever to have a humane and efficient system of immigration control, the main point of checking credentials must be moved from the point of entry to the point of origin of the immigrant. I am certain that the Wilson Committee were right in saying in paragraph 61 of their Report:
As to methods of control, we have been left in no doubt that many people from overseas feel it is an indignity that they are liable to be questioned at length about their intentions or family circumstances on arrival at a British port… Exclusion at this stage,


when the person concerned may have invested all his property and savings in hopes (however ill-founded) of entering the United Kingdom, can be a crushing blow and a bitter disappointment.
Some months ago I travelled in a plane to this country from Rawalpindi in Pakistan. At the airport was a Sikh family seeing off a member of their family, a boy or rather young man. The family surrounded the boy, the women were in tears and the head of the family walked out to the aircraft and gave the boy a family blessing as he went off. The boy was supposed to be entering the country as a boy under 16 years of age. During the course of the trip, I talked to him and I am reasonably certain that the boy was considerably older than 16. Il could be that, on arrival at London Airport, an X-ray could have been taken of the boys wrists from which it could be deduced that he was 17, 18 or 19, but it would be a tragedy for that boy and for his family if, at that point, a large sum of money having been invested in the air passage and plans having been made for his future, this boy had been returned to Pakistan, as I think legally he probably ought to have been. It so happened that the boy went through Immigration Control without let or hindrance, and he emerged only a few moments after I had seen him queuing up at the barrier. However, the point at which his credentials should have been checked was Rawalpindi and not the desk at London Airport.
I am certain that we shall never get a humane and efficient system of immigration control until we go even further than the Wilson Committee recommended. The point was not in its terms of reference, so it could hardly have made a firm recommendation on it. Arrangements should be made to make the granting of entry certificates for visas mandatory on those countries from which we have an immigration problem.
One aspect of the Bill which I welcomed without too many reservations, until I heard the Home Secretary today, is the granting of bail to those whose credentials are in doubt. I want to see immigration reduced very sharply, but I do not believe that it is right to treat those who want to come to this country

as potential criminals. It may be wrong for them to want to come here, but surely it is not a criminal matter that one should wish to enter.
I have had brought to my attention the case of a man who arrived at a British airport claiming to be more than 60 years of age. He could speak no English, and he found himself in Wormwood Scrubs, where he stayed for some weeks while his case was argued out and his credentials checked. I do not know whether he was telling the truth. He may have been over 60. But the fact remains that those who want to come here should not end up in Wormwood Scrubs.
This is not an isolated case. On 7th November, I asked the Home Secretary how many prospective Commonwealth immigrants have been held in prisons, borstals or detention centres during 1967 and the first nine months of 1968 while inquiries have been made about their eligibility. In 1967, the number so detained was 54. In the first nine months of 1968, the figure had leapt up to 106. While I see that it is expensive for adequate arrangements to be made, it is essential that they should be made and that such people should not be detained in prison and treated like common criminals.
I welcome the arrangements which have been made for the granting of bail, although clearly some system of identification or fingerprinting will have to be used to make sure that people do not abuse the system to be introduced and treat it as merely a cheap way of getting into the country. However, so long as we maintain the main system of check at our airports and ports instead of introducing a mandatory entry visa system and checking the credentials in the country of origin, we shall continue to have great difficulty at our ports and airports, regardless of the system of appeal that we introduce.

5.35 p.m.

Dame Joan Vickers: I feel a little nervous about intervening in this legal debate, but I want to put a few points to the Under-Secretary of State. Perhaps I might say, too, that from my experiences with au pair girls I have a great admiration for the work of our immigration officers.
I want first of all to draw attention to paragraph 66 of the Wilson Committee's Report, which says:
… opinion among our witnesses was virtually unanimous in favour of establishing some kind of system of appeals".
Having read the Report thoroughly and studied Appendix V, I would have hoped that we might have incorporated more of the Canadian system into ours, particularly with reference to paragraph 14 of that Appendix, because it seems to be a very satisfactory method.
Paragraph 119 of the Report, referring to the suggested scheme of appeals, says:
We believe that under this scheme the great majority of appeals against exclusion can be disposed of speedily at the ports. We hope that it will normally be possible for an appellant to be given at least a preliminary hearing by an adjudicator within a few hours..
How is that to happen? The Canadians, who have a smaller problem, have over 200 inquiry officers. The adoption of such a scheme here may mean a vast staff if it is to be done at the speed suggested. I would like an indication of the number of staff it is thought will be needed for the purpose.
Earlier in the debate, one hon. Member referred to the conditions in which some of these people are detained, and I want to make a plea for quick action to be taken, especially about the conditions in which young women are kept. The Report says that the present system of immigration control can be "a harassing and frightening experience" to an immigrant who has had a long and exhausting journey and finds himself in a strange environment and perhaps confronted with language difficulties. Girls of 16 years are sent to Holloway and boys are sent to remand homes and borstals, where their first contact with anyone in this country is with criminals. Could not some arrangements be made whereby the Y.W.C.A. catered, at any rate, for the girls? The present system seems to be extremely cruel when one considers the possible language difficulties and the fact that some of them have never before spent a night away from their homes. I have heard of accommodation where people are detained which can accommodate 17 young men or two families. There are no amenities, or even a radio, for them while they are kept waiting,

which may be for days. One woman was kept for 18 days without a change of clothes. I hope that all these points will be looked into, and it may be that the R.W.V.S. could be asked to take a hand in seeing that better arrangements are made in future, especially for some of the younger people wanting to come here.
In paragraphs 146 and 147 of the Report, it is suggested that, if anything is not to the satisfaction of the individual concerned, he or she may be able to appeal to the Parliamentary Commissioner or Ombudsman. I hope that that suggestion will not be adopted, as it does not appear to me to be necessary.
If we are to have a Bill, I hope that it will be fair. I would much prefer a system to be established on the Canadian lines—in particular I refer to paragraph 14, page 83.
However, I would draw attention to paragraph 141 of the Report, which says:
This addition of a judicial element to the United Kingdom's system of immigration control will be a factor of importance if this country joins the European Economic Community, within which certain people are entitled to freedom of movement. It will also come nearer to realising the ideal of 'due process of law' embodied in certain international conventions.
I should like to be sure that the Bill fulfils both these points raised by the Wilson Committee.

Clause 11 empowers the Secretary of State to make rules of procedure for appeal proceedings. I should like some knowledge of what these rules of procedure are to be. Have they been drafted? Otherwise, we are agreeing to sections of this Bill rather blindly. I should like to know what has been considered.

I should also like to support the opinion expressed by my right hon. Friend the Member for Ashford (Mr. Deedes) concerning paragraph 149. Perhaps this could be dealt with in Committee.

On deportation, paragraph 132, the Wilson Committee notes
… the Government's proposal that the Home Secretary should have power to repatriate on his own initiative a Commonwealth citizen who had obtained entry by misrepresentation …

I understand that the Bill empowers the Secretary of State to deport Commonwealth citizens for breach of conditions


of admission, but it does not end the powers to recommend deportation. This seems an unfortunate dual system and would be better left to the courts. Perhaps the hon. Gentleman, in reply, would care to comment on that.

The Wilson Committee, in paragraph 153, concerning the appointment of adjudicators, recommends that their appointment should be vested in the Secretary of State. I think that this is a great pity. I believe that they should be entirely separate from the immigration service which is responsible to the Home Secretary. This has been touched upon by my right hon. and learned Friend, the Member for St. Marylebone (Mr. Hogg). I think that adjudicators should be appointed by the Lord Chancellor. The Wilson Committee also recommend:
In order that the adjudicators should be seen to be independent of the Home Office, we tink it advisable that all those appointed on the first establishment of the appeal system should be drawn from outside the public service.

I attach great importance to this, as I consider the adjudicators should never be appointed from the immigration service. I hope that this point will be considered, because if Clause 1, which empowers the Secretary of State to make the appointments if this Clause is enacted as it stands, it is essential that the Government are pressed that this should not be taken as it appears to me to read.

Part II of Schedule 1, paragraph 7, suggests the appointment of
barristers, advocates or solicitors, in each case of not less than seven years' standing.
I do not wish to be rude to my barrister friends or legal luminaries in the House, but I think that this is unfortunate. If this is not to be changed, I hope that it may be possible, in view of the language difficulty, to find barristers of this standing in this country who are from overseas countries.

Mr. Oakes: Clause 7 of the Schedule also says, "… and such number of the other members of the tribunal." The tribunal will not be composed entirely of barristers and solicitors.

Dame Joan Vickers: It would appear that we are to have a tremendous number of these people and I do not think that this is the right approach. I would prefer to have magistrates, who are not mentioned

at all. Magistrates could play a very great part.
I should like to know why in Clause 2(1) there is no appeal against refusal of work vouchers by the Department of Employment and Productivity. If we are to have appeals against coming into this country, surely there ought to be provision for appeals against the non-issue of a work voucher from the Department of Employment and Productivity.
Concerning Clause 16, I should like to know why police officers are to be asked to go and investigate people's private houses. Surely our police have enough to do. I think that welfare officers or others to be appointed by the Minister should do the job, not the police. It is not desirable, anyhow, that the police have this added duty of entering houses.
Schedule 2, paragraph 4(1)(b) is unclear about the position of the applicant if the adjudicator refuses leave to appeal and the applicant still wishes to go before the tribunal. Perhaps when the Minister replies he will clarify this point.
Schedule 3 paragraph 2 concerns the power of arrest by the immigration officer of a person released on bail if he has reasonable grounds for believing that that person is likely to break the conditions. I do not see how anyone will have reasonable grounds for believing that a person is likely to slip his bail. Therefore, when the hon. Gentleman replies, perhaps he will answer these various points.

5.45 p.m.

Mr. Ronald Bell: I do not always agree with my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for St. Marylebone (Mr. Hogg) on these subjects, but today I find myself in full accord with everything that he has said, both in its general tenor and even in the particularities of his speech. I noticed his observation that if there had been a free vote today he would have voted against the Bill. Since my right hon. Friend the Member for Ash-ford (Mr. Deedes) expresed the same view—and others besides—and my hon. Friend the Member for Beckenham (Mr. Goodhart), if I understood him, spoke broadly to the same effect, and I do not notice in the Chamber any warm champion on this side for the Bill, I am puzzled to know why we are not voting against the Bill. My right hon. and


learned Friend said that he was in a minority. But sometimes people thinking that they are in a minority discover, too late perhaps, that their views represent those of a majority of their colleagues. I think that that might be the position today.
The Bill has two sides, as has been observed by a number of hon. Members on both sides. It is a legal Bill and it is about immigration. There is a risk that the fact that it is about immigration may engage some people on one side of the debate upon its merits. I will come to that aspect in a moment. I address myself, first, to what I believe to be the principal considerations today, namely, those set out by my right hon. and learned Friend. I propose to do this much more shortly than I had originally intended, because my right hon. and learned Friend expressed my thoughts almost in the very words I might have chosen.
Broadly speaking, the Bill provides that political discretion shall be replaced by judicial discretion. Clause 8(1)(a)(ii) reads,
where the decision of action involved the exercise of a discretion by the Secretary of State or an officer, that the discretion should have been exercised differently…".
That is a ground on which the adjudicator or the Tribunal could reverse a decision.
The Home Secretary made no bones about this when he said, quite frankly, that whereas in the past he had been on the receiving end of representations from hon. Members on both sides about this or that case, whether the discretion had been rightly exercised and someone perhaps excluded who should have been let in, or the other way round, in future he would be relieved of this difficult function because the final responsibility would rest with the adjudicator or the tribunal. The Home Office would retain the initiative, that is, the initial decision would be made by the Home Office, but the final decision would be made by a judicial body.
This is about immigration, but does it not raise quite general considerations with which this House ought by now to concern itself? With others, I have watched a growing tendency for the powers of Parliament—the discretion of the Executive, which is much the same

thing, since we control the Executive—to be farmed out to bodies which are remote from political control. Where the decision is one of fact, or concerned with the innocence or guilt of a specified offence, it is right that judicial procedures should be used and political pressures minimised, but where the decision is a political one, it is surely very dangerous for this House to see the ultimate power pass away beyond its reach and scope. That is a growing tendency.
The Home Secretary described this as an extension of the rule of law. That is a rather odd use of the phrase. I prefer my own definition—the replacement of a political discretion by a judicial discretion. If there is one thing that courts or judicial tribunals are bad at it is exercising a discretion, because, in the view of lawyers—I am proud to be one, but they have their faults—a discretion is something to be progressively exercised according to rules, and they describe one that is not as an arbitrary discretion.
To exist at all a discretion must be arbitrary. There is no such thing as a discretion which is exercised according to rules. It disappears once there are rules which govern its exercise. This is the process in which we have all, oddly enough, been collaborating together in recent years. We call it the advance of the rule of law but it is really the retreat of Parliamentary and political responsibility.
For that reason I oppose the Bill. I would not need to look for any other reason to oppose it. I would not mind whether it was about immigration or a wholly different subject. It is a step on a bad course upon which we have been set. Being inhibited by less strong bonds of discipline than my right hon. and learned Friends, I am not sure of the course of action to which this view of mine may ultimately lead.
This proposal is made in relation to immigration. Here, too, I find reason for being disturbed. This is a very strange structure to erect upon the quagmire of our existing law. My right hon. and learned Friend set out the history of aliens and Commonwealth legislation. The salient feature that emerges from both is that they are so drawn that all decisions in both fields are discretionary. Any tribunal could decide the question


whether a person was a Commonwealth immigrant or whether he was my right hon. and learned Friend returning from a visit to France. That is a question of fact. It might not be one of great difficulty. But have we to set up half a million £s worth of special tribunals to decide such facts? I should have thought that the ordinary courts could settle them. These tribunals will decide whether somebody, in exercise of discretion, should have been let in or kept out, or whether conditions of admission ought to have been imposed, or whether the conditions that were imposed should have been imposed.
What sort of people shall we appoint to these tribunals who have experience or knowledge qualifying to supersede the discretion of the Home Secretary? The hon. Member for Bolton, West (Mr. Oakes) said that we could appoint solicitors. He was kind enough also to suggest barristers. Both are splendid kinds of people, but they are not specifically trained to exercise that kind of discretion, which is a discretion at large, or a political discretion. It can be exercised by persons on behalf of the Home Secretary but ultimately the decision should rest with him.

Mr. Oakes: Does not the hon. and learned Member agree that if we have this appeals system it would be far better that the adjudicators should have some legal qualification, rather than that they should be ex-immigration officers or people trying to exercise, for example, the rules of evidence although they themselves are not lawyers and have no experience of exercising such a discretion?

Mr. Bell: No. Granted the system, I reach the opposite conclusion. I would rather see ex-immigration officers with experience of handling immigrants than lawyers who have experience of the rules of evidence.
My right hon. Friend the Member for Ashford gave the reasons why. We must bear in mind the kind of operation that is being conducted. My right hon. Friend described it as a battle of wits. It is a battle of wits. The Bill, in this battle of wits between the officers who are doing our job and the organisers of every kind of illegal immigration, is bringing aid and comfort to the wrong side. The

lawyers, with their knowledge of evidence and their formalised approach to these things, are unwillingly and perhaps unwittingly going to be fighting for the law evader rather than the law enforcer.
Underlying these proposals is something else which also slightly disturbs me. It underlays part of the Prime Minister's statement on the Commonwealth Prime Minister's Conference yesterday—the concept that the tens of thousands who want to come here have some kind of inherent right to come here, and that in putting up a screen to filter them we are in some way interfering with basic human rights, so that this immense care and particularity and double care and cross-checking is right and proper.
I do not believe that to be so. I regret the phrase "absorptive capacity" in the Prime Minister's statement yesterday, implying that there is a duty on Britain to take as many immigrants as it can manage to absorb, and the mention of quotas, which were referred to as in some way belonging to various nations, and the statement that there would be a cut in this quota or that quota. That is surely a total misconception of our position and of the function of immigration control. We have a right to control the composition of our population. To describe it as our duty to take in as many as our absorptive capacity will admit is absurd, and to speak in terms of other countries having quotas is preposterous.
For all these excellent reasons, I strongly oppose the Bill and can give no undertaking that when the time comes I shall not vote against it.

6.0 p.m.

Sir Douglas Glover: All the arguments why the Bill should not be accepted have been put forward forcibly. I am surprised that the Opposition are not to vote against it. The fact that one votes against a Bill does not always show anger, but can mean that the Government of the day have not got the thing right. The arguments today overwhelmingly prove this view. We should view with far more alarm than we appear to do when discussing this kind of Bill what my hon. and learned Friend the Member for South Buckinghamshire (Mr. Ronald Bell) said about the reduction in the power of the High Court of Parliament.


I agree that that ground alone is sufficient reason for opposing the Bill.
I cannot see the Bill operating successfully even when it is passed. I agree with my right hon. Friend the Member for Ashford (Mr. Deedes) that, in a battle of wits, it is not conceivable that a lot of superannuated lawyers will produce a more satisfactory system than we have at present. At least under the present system immigration officers are specialists, while all the decisions of these so-called courts will be political and not legal. The whole basis of this matter is political, so those in the Home Office would be far more skilled and qualified to act as the "second court of appeal" from the decision of the immigration officers than any other system.
Largely, what the Bill will do is produce a facade to make everyone feel slightly more comfortable in his conscience and that is all. It will bring no more justice to those who feel themselves victimised than they get at present. But there could be another consequence of appointing what I would call a "court of second opinion" to cross-check an immigration officer's decision at Heathrow Airport. If he finds that this court often reverses his opinion, he and his colleagues will let far more people through, because they will say, "What is the use of being careful and checking them?". The people whose credentials are weak or "phoney" will have a pretty good idea before reaching Heathrow that it will now be a case of Russian roulette as to whether an immigration officer stops the particular person whose case is weak or the one right behind him whose case is strong.
It is impossible to vet in detail every person going through an immigration channel. Since there is this lottery element and the immigration officer finds that some of his decisions, which he feels were soundly based, are altered by a less experienced body of people, it will reduce his morale and keenness and may easily reduce the number of people wanting to enlist in the immigration service. The only way in which this system could be controlled is at the point of departure and not the point of entry and I am surprised that we have not taken far stronger measures to get some such system operating in the country of departure. Until we do, we shall not improve the situation;

the only reason for the Bill is our knowledge that the system is not satisfactory.
This Bill is not all that important. What is important is that it is another example of reducing the power and influence of Parliament and giving us less control over the Executive. On these grounds alone, we in the Conservative Party should not be lending it our support.

6.4 p.m.

Mrs. Renée Short: The Opposition appear to be in a schizophrenic mood this evening—

Sir Gerald Nabarro: Not at all.

Mrs. Short: Oh, yes. The last two speakers have said how much they oppose the Bill, but I gather that they will not vote against it. We on this side would not mind if they did: I hope that they are not inhibited on that account.
The Bill is welcome because, if we have immigration regulations, which we must have, then it is essential that they should be enforced and should be seen to be equitably and fairly enforced. We will all agree that there have been many sad cases of people being treated badly. Although most of the immigration officers do their job well, there have been exceptions, and some children have been sent home on, as it turned out, wrong premises. We have seen non-coloured visitors being unfairly treated as well. I remember the Swedish girl who was asked to strip some time ago and a diplomat's wife who was rather badly handled. The fact that we are now framing legislation on the lines proposed by the Wilson Committee shows that we accept that things have not been as they should be and that we want to correct them.
We have now reduced considerably the numbers coming here to work, and this is a great credit to my hon. Friend and to the Secretary of State. The position is quite different now from what it was when the party opposite were in power. In 1963, 30,000 work vouchers were issued and today the figure is just over 4,000, which will obviously affect the number of dependants coming in. But the main problem at present for


coloured immigrants is that their dependants have to prove things like their age, which is very difficult and cannot be done without a considerable margin of error, the relationship between themselves and the person whom they are coming to join, and the fact that there is adequate accommodation for them.
The police have been used to investigate these cases, as has been said. I remember a case in Birmingham not very long ago of a family which came down to meet someone at London Airport, having to spend a great deal of money on taxi fares. There was a great deal of delay at the airport and much to-ing and fro-ing between the immigration authorities and the police while the accommodation was investigated. The police investigation was not really satisfactory; they did not even enter the house to see what accommodation there was. The case was only resolved because a member of the Press was able to press the right authorities to see that the investigation was carried out. This sort of case shows that we need this appeals machinery.
Of course it is not only in connection with coloured immigrants that the legislation will have an effect. It will apply also, presumably, to aliens, who are up to all the old tricks as well. We all know of male Italian waiters wanting to come in for "holidays", but who have their waiter's uniform in their luggage. Of course immigration officers must be on the qui vive to ensure that the regulations are not broken.
One or two points cause concern. As I understand it, the Bill will bring us somewhat into line with the procedures now carried out in the United States. They have very strict immigration control but also appeal machinery, and in that case it is automatic appeal.
Are we right to set up this sort of machinery, with all the difficulties that will be involved, when many of those who wish to come here will not be able to speak our language, will not understand how the machinery is used and may not lodge their appeals in time? I am particularly thinking of children who come unaccompanied. Consider the plight of an Indian boy aged 13 or 14 who does not speak English arriving here unaccompanied. Who will see that his appeal is properly lodged?
Would it not be better to have an automatic right of appeal so that anyone who is refused admission will have his or her case automatically channelled in the right direction without the immigrant having to rely on distraught and frightened travellers who may have come long distances and who probably will not understand the machinery we are establishing?

The question of what is to be done with would-be immigrants while their appeals are pending is a matter of great concern. I appreciate that provisions for bail exist, but those who cannot be released until a decision has been made are in a different position. Are we to continue sending young girls and elderly women to prison? This whole business is distressing and I hope that it will be avoided. I would particularly like to see young people put in the care of a local authority until their appeals have been heard.

I agree with the hon. Member for Ormskirk (Sir D. Glover) that a great deal needs to be done in the country of origin. I, too, have pressed for this course to be adopted. We could reduce many of the difficulties which now arise at ports of entry here if certificates of entry were obligatory in countries of origin for all people who wish to come to Britain. More facilities should be established in, for example, India, and I cannot see why we should not set up centres in that country and elsewhere and so overcome many of the problems about which we have been speaking before the immigrants arrive here. We know from the heads of families in this country the areas from which the majority of dependants come. It would not be difficult to select the most suitble areas in the countries of origin in which to set up these facilities.

Our representatives in those countries could investigate the family cases—family backgrounds, relationships, ages, and so on—of those who wish to come here to join their fathers, husbands and other relatives. This would reduce to a minimum the number of cases that would be in dispute when immigrants arrive in Britain. I therefore urge the Home Secretary to reconsider this matter. The whole process would be made smoother and the need to accommodate people while their appeals are pending, with all


the expenditure and anxiety which must be involved, would no longer be necessary.

Further help would arise if we accepted another proposal that I have made. It is that we should phase the entry of dependants to a number each year that we could reasonably, decently and humanely absorb from a housing and educational point of view. If we knew that we would be receiving not 50,000 dependants but, say, 20,000, many of the cases in which disputes arise when immigrants arrive here would be avoided.

Apart from the reservations I have mentioned, I find the Bill acceptable and I gladly support it.

6.15 p.m.

Sir Gerald Nabarro: I had no intention of participating in this debate until I heard the speech of my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for St. Marylebone (Mr. Hogg). He convinced me that my worst suspicions about the Bill were correct. First, however, I warmly congratulate him on his historical dissertation concerning the condition of our immigration laws since the earliest times until the passing of the 1962 Act. As always, I learned a great deal from him, in a strictly legal sense.

Mr. Hogg: I thank, my hon. Friend.

Sir G. Nabarro: Does my right hon. and learned Friend wish to interrupt me at this early stage in my speech? I assure him that I have much to say that is highly provocative.
When my right hon. and learned Friend went on to say that there were serious objections of a constitutional character in this proposed legislation, I sat up and took notice. I regard him as a great constitutionalist and lawyer. I am neither. I follow creatures like my right hon. and learned Friend in these important matters, and when he says that there are serious constitutional objections then I must think again about my forthcoming behaviour in the Lobby tonight.
I am not qualified to talk about the constitutional or legal aspects of the Bill, and I have no intention of doing so. Nevertheless, I have grave practical

objections to everything proposed in the Measure. It is always philosophically companionable and placating to the consciences of those of us who consider ourselves to be humane creatures, to say to our constituents and friends, or even to our audiences in, for example, the Oxford Town Hall, so well known to my right hon. and learned Friend and myself, that if there is a harsh and severe Statute we should allow a right of appeal against its provisions.
Do-gooders everywhere—those who favour unlimited immigration into this country—and I am not one of them—have proclaimed in recent years, "If you restrict immigration into Britain, you must have a right of appeal." It all sounds very nice, but it is really grossly impracticable to have a right of appeal.

Mrs. Renée Short: Mrs. Renée Shortindicated dissent.

Sir G. Nabarro: I shall be coming to the hon. Lady's comments shortly. I am always delighted to speak following her.
Not only is it grossly impracticable to have a right of appeal with limited immigration into this country, but I believe that it is fundamentally wrong. I will state my position in unmistakable terms, and I am in conflict with my party on this issue. I do not believe in restricted immigration into Britain, I believe in no further coloured immigration into Britain—[Interruption.]—in exactly those terms; and if there is to be no further coloured immigration, then it follows as a corollary that there is no need for an appeal.

Mr. Bidwell: What about half-castes?

Sir G. Nabarro: The hon. Gentleman is surely joking.

Mr. Bidwell: I am not. What about the children of mixed marriages?

Sir G. Nabarro: When I say "no further coloured immigration" that includes dependants—and I shall develop this theme—whatever the nature of the marriage. I should not be judged scornfully by my Parliamentary colleagues. On the contrary, I believe that I speak for an overwhelming majority of the population of this country today in the terms of non-immigration in the future.
That is my fundamental objection to the Bill, but the practical objection simply follows in more precise terms what was said by the hon. Lady the Member for Wolverhampton, North-East (Mrs. Rene e Short). I do not want consideration given to formalities as to immigration into the United Kingdom at the point of embarkation from a Commonwealth or foreign country, to travel to Britain. I want the matter judged in unmistakable terms, which would be perfectly possible were the administration here completely sound; but it is very unsound, for reasons I shall enunciate.
I would have the appropriate Department of State here print in great detail and in every foreign language of countries from which immigrants are likely to try to come from their lands of origin to Britain the provisions in regard to entry to this country. Then, if a would-be immigrant wished to proceed on a journey to this country and to make application for a work permit he would apply in advance from his point of origin. A Pakistani from Lahore or Karachi would apply at the British consulate in Lahore or Karachi, [interruption.] My right hon. and learned Friend is mumbling. He may not agree with me, but I am at least as good an administrator as he is—not as good a lawyer, but at least as good an administrator.
I know that this kind of thing is utterly possible. It could be done at any British consulate in any British Commonwealth country or foreign country. The application could be completed and then sent here. If the application were granted on the very restricted entry scale, at present allowed, an entry permit would be sent. Then there would be no argument at the point of arrival in this country when the person arrived as to his admittance. If it were refused the person would not travel because no airline would accept a booking from anyone wishing to travel to this country unless he produced a valid permit to enter the United Kingdom.

The Under-Secretary of State for the Home Department (Mr. Merlyn Rees): I am grateful to the hon. Member for giving way, because I should like to return to this important point. Off the cuff, I believ2 that the number of aliens coming to this country every year is 3 million Is the hon. Member saying that everyone coming to these shores, aliens

as well as Commonwealth citizens, should have to have an entry certificate? Does he take the figure of 3 million at the starting point, or does he say only certain people are envisaged?

Sir G. Nabarro: Presumably those immigrants wishing to come to this country wish to work. They have to work to live. [An HON. MEMBER: "No".] We know that there are some illicit entrants and tourists, but we are not concerned in the Bill with tourists.

Mr. Merlyn Rees: We are.

Sir G. Nabarro: The hon. Gentleman can answer me when he answers the debate. Every hon. Member who has spoken has made the point that validation of entry to this country should be at the point of departure from the country which the would-be immigrant leaves, not on arrival here.
The second practical objection to the Bill is simply the conditions and what will occur to the would-be immigrants if they are detained at the point of entry awaiting appeal against refusal. How long is that to be—a matter of 24 hours, a week or a month? Now we are embarking on a judicial procedure as to the legal wrangling which will take place about whether a relative of a Pakistani, an Indian, West Indian or Nigerian should be admitted or not with all the complications about children which were alluded to by the hon. Lady.
Surely we are setting up for ourselves a huge store of trouble in looking after these men and women for anything up to two or three months before their cases can be judged. Or is the proposal instant justice?

Mr. Merlyn Rees: Mr. Merlyn Reesindicated assent.

Sir G. Nabarro: The hon. Gentleman nods in assent that there should be instant justice. Does he envisage something like Ellis Island? Is there to be a court of appeal sitting at London Airport, at the Port of Immingham, the Port of Cardiff and the Port of Glasgow—sitting at any place where any ship or any aeroplane may come in? Is there to be a court to deal with immigrants along with all the abracadabra of the law with the adjudicators and barristers in attendance, and their clerks, proliferating courts throughout the United Kingdom to deal


with appeals by immigrants with or without their children?
Not only is this a preposterous suggestion, but it is surely an utterly impracticable suggestion. I do not even think that the legal profession, populous as it is—

Mr. Hogg: Undermanned.

Sir G. Nabarro: My right hon. and learned friend says it is undermanned, but it is undermanned only because of the abstruse character of too numerous Statutes passed in recent years, many of them not only imponderable but utterly incomprehensible and incapable of understanding by lay minds.
We shall have these appeals with all the barristers and the abracadabra of the law at proliferating points of entry throughout the United Kingdom. Is that what is proposed? If there were one central court of appeal for these immigrants I could understand it. If it were just one at London Airport, or in the Port of London, then if someone were refused in Glasgow he would be put on a train and brought with an escort down to that port with barristers opposing and supporting, but it is not that at all. There are to be scores of these ports and the public expense will be immeasurable.
I turn to the final aspect of the impracticalities of this measure. My hon. Friend the Member for Plymouth, Devon-port (Dame Joan Vickers) talked about work vouchers. She said that there ought to be appeals in the matter of work vouchers. This is quite ridiculous. I am glad that the Under-Secretary nods in assent. I do not wish to castigate my hon. Friend because she is an old friend of mine outside this House as well as inside it [HON. MEMBERS: "Oh."] Oh yes, for many years. These men and women, who want to come to Britain to work and apply for work vouchers, are all over the world. If we refuse permission for them to come to work are we to have appeals in all the embarkation places all round the Commonwealth? Shall we have a court of appeal in Calcutta, another in Hong Kong, another in Lagos, another in Kingston, Jamaica, on the question of work vouchers? This has only to be stated to be seen to be ridiculous.
If we allow them to come here to launch their appeal then one has all the harrowing circumstances—I really mean harrowing circumstances—of near deportation to get them back to their point of origin, with the likelihood of mistakes such as were related by the hon. Member for Wolverhampton, North-East. Her speech was much to my liking, save for only one passage. My hon. Friend the Member for Devonport is quite wrong, and the hon. Lady the Member for Wolverhampton, North-East is quite right. [HON. MEMBERS: "Oh".] Yes. There is trans-fertilisation of female Members.
The hon. Member for Wolverhampton, North-East is now a symbol in the Labour Party for stringent restriction of immigration. She is doing what her party refused to do in 1962. So vigorous was the opposition of the Labour Party to the mild form of restrictionism brought in by the Conservative Government that we had to resort to a guillotine to get the Commonwealth Immigrants Bill on the Statute Book. That shows what political humbug there is in the Labour Party.
On both fundamental and practical grounds I am very much opposed to the Bill. I hate being out of step with my right hon. and learned Friend. He is a splendid lawyer and constitutionalist but, like so many legal types, he is very impractical. I voted against the Third Reading of the Race Relations Act because it was impractical. I had no other reason. I recognise no difference on account of the colour of men's skins—none at all. All God's creatures are equal in my eyes. But I saw the most grave impracticalities in that Act and I see similar grave impracticalities in the Bill.
If my hon. Friends will come with me, I will do what my right hon. and learned Friend is too timid to do. Were he not in the Shadow Cabinet, he would be voting against the Bill, as I am. He knows that he would. But I do not want to tempt him to rebel. He does not like the Bill. But I am allowed to vote against the Bill. I do not sit in the Shadow Cabinet—no such privileged position for me. I follow my mentor in this matter—my right hon. Friend the Member for Ashford (Mr. Deedes), who was


exactly right in his objections to the Bill.
I invite my hon. Friends to follow my right hon. Friend the Member for Ashford, my hon. and learned Friend the Member for Buckinghamshire, South (Mr. Ronald Bell), my hon. Friend the Member for St. Albans (Mr. Goodhew), my hon. Friend the Member for Ormskirk (Sir D. Glover) and others in opposition to the Bill. I hope that my hon. Friends the Members for Chigwell (Mr. Biggs-Davison) and Wembley, North (Sir E. Bullus) will come into the Lobby with us this evening, thereby denoting that we regard this Measure as grossly impractical. We do not wish to see the splendid leadership of my right hon. Friend the Member for Bexley (Mr. Heath) impugned in future controversies on account of the hard core in his party—my hon. Friends and myself—nursing such grave objections to this Bill.

6.34 p.m.

Sir Eric Errington: I am very concerned about what I consider to be an unnecessarily cumbersome method of dealing with this situation. A year or sc ago, while on the Estimates Committee, I had the opportunity of examining the Home Office and, in particular, immigration methods of keeping "tabs" on those coming into the country. I looked at the microfilms, of which there are many hundreds of thousands. I realised what a difficult situation it was for any Government Department accurately to keep the position of the various entrants. I fear that this problem has not been fully realised by the Government, however. They do not appear to appreciate the great difficulties in keeping, in such a way, the statistics—the microfilms and what have you—to deal with the problems. Insufficient consideration has been given to several aspects.
The first of these has been raised by several hon. Members, including my hon. Friend the Member for Worcestershire, South (Sir G. Nabarro) and the hon. Lady the Member for Wolverhampton, North-East (Mrs. Renée Short). Why should these matters not be dealt with in the first instance in the country of origin? There does not seem to be an argument against that. According to the Wilson Report, two members of the Committee went to Pakistan and India and two

went to Canada. That is not the way one would have thought the situation should have been dealt with. There should have been diplomatic discussions, which could, surely, have taken place on the basis of a working arrangement and whereby our diplomatic staffs in various parts of the world could have been required to go into these matters and make recommendations in consultation with the representatives of the country concerned. It would not have been adding too much to their duties.
Recommendations in themselves may not be the final answer, but what strikes me as most peculiar, admitting that there should be a court of appeal, is the statement in paragraph 105 of the Wilson Report:
There are demonstrably special reasons which make a tribunal more appropriate, namely, the need for cheapness, accessibility, freedom from technicality, expedition and expert knowledge of a particular subject.
I would have expected the Committee to deal with this course in its recommendations. But even if the Committee did not do so, the Government should have considered it as a way of ensuring a clear opportunity for anyone who thought he had been unfairly excluded to have an appeal to get his case reconsidered.
Instead of this, however, we have—I do not know that there is a word for it; I was going to say "mausoleum"—this immense effort. The financial effects will total £500,000. In addition, the exercise of this power may result in some increase in the number of Commonwealth citizens who are deported. It may reach an additional 10,000 a year.
I hoped that the Government were doing their best to reduce not only expenditure but also public service manpower, but now there are to be 24 full-time adjudicators. Incidentally, who thought of the word "adjudicators"? Surely we have enough judicial people without giving more a special name. There are also to be 40 supporting staff. In addition, we are to have an increase of 70 in the non-industrial staff of the Home Office. The Secretary of State said that the scheme would be a little expensive. It will be very considerably expensive as well as unnecessary. There is also to be an increase of 50 in the Diplomatic Service, which adds to the expense.
Let me tell the Secretary of State that if I could have those bodies and that money I could make a very much better, more realistic and sensible job of this than is being done in the Bill. I shall vote against it.

6.41 p.m.

Mr. Antony Buck: This Bill is in bad need of a champion. I cannot myself adopt that rôle. We shall have to wait for the Under-Secretary to do that. We now return to lawyers' abracadabra and get away from the difficult things which have been discussed by my hon. Friend the Member for Worcestershire, South (Sir G. Nabarro).
There are two points which disturb me most about the administration of our immigration affairs at the moment. The first concerns their efficiency and the second concerns their humanity. I will deal, first, with their efficiency. Many of us on this side of the House and, I imagine, on the benches opposite have done a lot of work in visiting ports and airports trying to ascertain how efficiently our immigration control is working. The conclusion which many of us have reached is that it is not working efficiently, not through any fault of the immigration officers but because of the system."
Last year, as the House knows, about 49,000 dependants came to this country. I have heard it said that no fewer than 60 per cent. of those alleged dependants should not have been admitted. I have heard other figures of an even more dramatic character. If that be correct this is an appalling situation. If, of the 49,000 who came here, 60 per cent. were not entitled to do so either because they were outside the age group, or they were not within the proper degree of dependency, that is an appalling situation.
I hear that there has been a follow-up survey of those coming here as dependants and that that survey shows that the figure of illicit entry is very high indeed and is of the order of what I have just stated, or even higher. This gravely concerns me and, indeed, the immigration officers themselves. This is the first major thing which worries me about the implementation of our immigration policy.

Mr. Callaghan: Is the hon. Gentleman saying that 60 per cent. of the 49,000 people who have come here have done so illegally?

Mr. Buck: No, I am saying that had the true facts been known about the status of those 49,000, 60 per cent. of them would not have been entitled to come in.

Mr. John Mendelson: Will the hon. Member give the House the source of those figures? He has merely said that he had heard it. From whom has he heard it—the man in the public house, or has he some other source?

Mr. Buck: If the survey has not been carried out—

Mr. Mendelson: I am not asking about the hon. Gentleman's first statement. I am asking about his other statement, in which he gave the figures.

Mr. Buck: I have heard it said by what I regard as fairly reliable sources who are concerned with this work. I have heard that other hon. Members have received similar and even more dramatic figures.[HON. MEMBERS: "Oh".] If this is not true, I hope that it will be contradicted. I am not prepared to reveal where this information came from—[Interruption.]

Mr. Speaker: Order. We cannot debate by heckling or by sneezing.

Mr. Buck: This cross-fertilisation seems to be going around.
There is deep concern, as I am sure the Home Secretary and the Under-Secretary will confirm, among immigration officers at the degree of evasion which may be going on. I hope that this will be dealt with by the Under-Secretary when he winds up the debate.
I am concerned also about the humanity of the system. Last year, 2,571 immigrants who came to this country were returned. That is the official figure and it is a very large number indeed. That official figure I got from the Library of the House.

Mr. Callaghan: I am trying to follow the hon. Gentleman's argument. First of all, he gave a figure which I have never heard before and which I think is totally untrue, that 60 per cent. of people coming here would not be here if the truth about them were known. He then said that it is inhumane to send back 2,571 people whom the immigration officers said are not qualified to be here.


On the basis of this kind of logic we would, I suppose, be trebly inhumane.

Mr. Buck: I am obliged to the right hon. Gentleman. He has proved the point that we have got to have a system whereby these matters are determined at the place of embarkation in the country of origin. It would be possible to make proper checks in the country of origin to ensure that people who are not entitled to come here are not issued with entry certificates. That would preclude the necessity for a Bill such as this and would obviate the tremendous inhumanity involved in sending back over 2,500 people from this country.
In the Wilson Report this harassing and frightening experience was fully described in paragraph 61. We should adopt a certificate of entry system, which I was glad to hear being advocated by the hon. Lady the Member for Wolverhampton, North-East (Mrs. Renée Short). It is a bitter disappointment to us on this side of the House that the Government have not adopted such a system.
The Wilson Report makes this point in paragraph 70:
As the great majority of aliens who come to the United Kingdom are free from the visa requirement, we consider that it would be out of the question to impose on Commonwealth citizens the same requirement under another name.
That point would be met if our system were adopted and there were an assimilation of the system involving aliens and Commonwealth citizens. That is the only argument in the Report against the adoption overall of the certificate of entry system.
If our solution to the problem were implemented, there would be no need for an elaborate appeal system such as is proposed in the Bill. The effect would not be considerable on the numbers being returned—on the 2,000-plus figure which I have already quoted—because, as is known by the House and as was acknowledged by the Home Secretary, the immigration officers are doing an extremely good job. There are not many wrong decisions. Such was the conclusion of the Wilson Report, which said that the great majority of arrivals at ports are fairly and properly dealt with. Therefore,

the system will go on, with 2,700 being sent back.

Mr. Callaghan: My hon. Friend the Under-Secretary of State is to reply, but I have been reflecting on what the hon. Gentleman said about the 60 per cent. and I should say something about it. He is now saying that the immigration officers deal fairly with the people who come in, yet he says that they make mistakes with 60 per cent of the people who come in—that they are not entitled to be here.
I know of no authority for this figure, and I do not know what the hon. Gentleman's authority is. He is a responsible spokesman, but he should produce some evidence for this. If there is anything calculated to raise prejudice it would be the thought, if true, that 60 per cent. of people getting into these islands should not be here. I say to the hon. Gentleman quite categorically that no figure of this sort has ever been presented to me by my officials or anybody who knows. Their view is that with the tightening up in the procedure there are not many now who get through the net. As the hon. Gentleman says, the immigration officers are doing their work efficiently.
The hon. Gentleman may say that he cannot give his source, but he owes it to us to say why he has not hitherto conveyed this figure to me and told me what these alarming proportions are—on his figures they amount to tens of thousands of people—and given me the opportunity to see where this wildly exaggerated statement comes from and whether there is any truth in it, and to find out what the truth is.
I am ready to do so, but it is not good enough for the hon. Gentleman to fling the figure across the Floor of the House, for what reason, I do not know. It is the sort of thing that is bound to get a headline and create the most tremendous prejudice. Unless the hon. Gentleman has made the most detailed investigations, it is not good enough for him to say, "I have heard it said that …" and then create a scare of this sort.

Mr. Buck: Will the Home Secretary say whether there has been a survey such as I indicated there may have been?

Mr. Callaghan: It will be a pleasure. There has been no survey of that sort. The only survey made was that which I have already reported to the House, to find out how long after the voucher holder arrives his dependants follow. I have already given the House some information about that. It is an entirely different matter, quite unrelated to this. If the hon. Gentleman has no more information and can put it no stronger than, "I have heard it said …", and if he wishes us to regard him as responsible, he ought to withdraw it.

Mr. Buck: At this stage I can certainly not put it higher than, "I have heard it said". I shall tell the right hon. Gentleman more in private, but that is certainly as high as I can put it now. That, I think, deals with this situation.

Mr. Callaghan: Would the hon. Gentleman do me one further service and follow up his source, or sources, find out what information they have about this, and assess how reliable it is? He can keep the names away from me if he wants. Then will he let me know the source of it? But I am willing to say now that I do not believe a word of it.

Mr. Buck: I am very reassured by what the Home Secretary has just said. In view of what he says, I shall, of course, investigate this further and inform him. I shall withdraw if I find that there is, as he suggests, absolutely nothing in the figure or any other figures which have been mentioned. I shall gladly do that.
Our policy would be to adopt the system of certificates of entry. We think that that is the way to deal with the situation efficiently, and it would preclude the necessity for an appeal system as provided for in the Bill.
I now turn to some specific questions which I hope the Under-Secretary will answer. Will he say how much the adjudicators are to be paid? How much will the chief adjudicator receive? Where is their headquarters to be? Are they to operate in every port, and are they to be available at all the principal ports? What is to be their scheme of operation? What plans are there for building accommodation for them, if it is not already available?
I should also like answers to similar questions about the Tribunal. How much

are its members to be paid? How much will the President receive? Where will the members sit? Will they operate centrally? Is it expected that members of the Tribunal will be on circuit, as it were? How will that operate? Is the accommodation available? If not, what plans are there for building it?
There will obviously be some delays in granting bail to people. What is the position about their accommodation until they receive bail? It is estimated in the Financial and Explanatory Memorandum that the cost of the Bill will be about £500,000 a year. Is the hon. Gentleman satisfied that this is the appropriate figure? If so, can he give us a further breakdown of it? Can he say what is the capital expenditure likely to result from the Bill by way of the new buildings, courts, and so on, which may be required?
While the present system lasts, and we do not have a system of entry certificates, some sort of appeal system is right, but I should have preferred it to be confined to matters of fact and law, which are appropriate issues for a tribunal or court to determine. I am very doubtful about the discretionary matters being brought before a tribunal. I should have preferred this to be confined to the courts. The appropriate court might have been the county court, which has not been mentioned. I doubt whether the whole of this rather cumbersome procedure is necessary. Like my hon. Friends, I feel rather lukewarm about the whole matter.

6.58 p.m.

The Under-Secretary of State for the Home Department (Mr. Merlyn Rees): My hon. Friend the Member for Bolton, West (Mr. Oakes) touched the note that I would have thought should strike us all when dealing with this matter, when he said that it is not so much a question of law and statistics. What I have learnt of this subject during the past three months, with telephone calls in the middle of the night and a dedicated staff dealing with it in the Home Office—though this is not always generally appreciated—is that it is a question of humanity.
This is what lay behind the Wilson Report, and here I pay tribute to the Report and Sir Roy Wilson. The Report well repays reading; if it were read carefully it would stop many of the allegations and a complete misunderstanding of


the purpose of the Bill. The Report gave a valuable history of immigration control, which the right hon. and learned Member for St. Marylebone (Mr. Hogg) paraphrased. In debates in the House on increased immigration about 50 years ago, the reports of which also well repay reading, there were similar allegations, accompanied by "phoney" figures.
It seems that history repeats itself. I find figures being bandied about which have no relation to fact, and I regret the figures mentioned by the hon. Member for Colchester (Mr. Buck). His figure of 60 per cent. of 50,000 will be one that we shall hear time and time again, even when the matter is fully withdrawn. This sort of thing bedevils much of the discussion of the question of immigration.
My right hon. Friend hopes that the Select Committee, in publishing a great deal of information, as well as looking at various aspects of immigration, particularly the question of entry certificates, will play some part in dealing with this problem. In general, our debate today has not been couched in the same language as have discussions outside. I want to deal with many of the explanatory points raised and, if I cannot deal with all the questions, I will write to those hon. Members who raised them.
One point raised on many occasions dealt with putting into permanent legislative form the Acts and Orders which have to be dealt with every year under the Expiring Laws Continuance Bill. My right hon. Friend takes the points of the right hon. and learned Member for St. Marylebone, but I am convinced of one other point—that we shall have to see how the Bill works out in terms of numbers, and from that we will learn a great deal. There is much to be gained from leaving the position as it is for a year or two before putting into permanent form the legislation mentioned by the right hon. and learned Gentleman. It is a question of balance, but any Bill that is introduced, however small it might be, will not go through this House very quickly. It will raise so many issues that a great deal of Parliamentary time and careful drafting will be required.
The hon. and learned Member for Buckinghamshire, South (Mr. Ronald Bell) asked where it is stated that immigration rules are binding over appelate

authorities. It will be a Committee point, no doubt, but it is in Clause 8(1)((a)(i). It is an essential point because it is the follow-up of the Bill. My hon. Friend the Member for Wolverhampton, North-East (Mrs. Renée Short) asked whether there should be an automatic right of appeal. She will find that in paragraph 112 of the Wilson Report this was most carefully considered, but that there was a strong recommendation against it.
There is no analogy with the United States system. Their visas are compulsory, and it is only the few visa holders who are refused admission who have the right of appeal. To make appeals automatic here would reduce the immigration officers to cyphers, and might mean that the appellate authorities would be overwhelmed by cases. It is likely that, when we look at the number of cases heard, it will be seen that, in the early days, there will be a higher proportion of appeals going through the system than there will be later.
The hon. Lady the Member for Plymouth, Devonport (Dame Joan Vickers) asked whether the Bill complied with E.E.C. regulations and conventions. The answer is "Yes". The relevant E.E.C. and international documents are in Appendix 6 of the Report of the Wilson Committee, which took the E.E.C. situation into account in framing its recommendations.
I want to refer to one point germane to the whole basis of the Bill, although the hon. Member for Orpington (Mr. Lubbock), who asked it, is not here at present. He raised the important question of Scientology. Scientology apart, there are other similar situations which might arise. He asked whether a person coming into this country to study Scientology had a right of appeal under the appeals system. The appellate authorities will not be able to decide policy. If the Government wish to exclude people coming in to study Scientology, or anything else, then they can issue a published instruction to immigration officers saying that such people are not to be admitted.
I will not develop the point in so far as it relates to Scientology, but the appeals system is not handing over Government policy on immigration to legal or quasi-legal bodies. The policy of the


Government of the day will be made by the Government of the day.

Sir E. Errington: How does the hon. Gentleman relate this to Clause 9, which says that the Tribunal ought to retain the right to deal with security?

Mr. Rees: My right hon. Friend explained that—he said that the Government will retain the right to deal with security. The point was raised that the national interest was rather broad—where does one draw the line?
A number of hon. Gentlemen have raised questions about the Tribunals and Inquiries Act, 1958. Section 4(1) of that Act gives the Council power to make to
… the appropriate Minister general recommendations as to the making of appointments to membership of any such tribunals as are specified in the First Schedule to this Act. …
In accordance with the recommendation in paragraph 149 of the Wilson Report, it is proposed, when the Bill has become law, to make an Order under section 10 of the Tribunals and Inquiries Act, 1958.
The hon. Lady the Member for Devonport raised, among other questions, that of Clause 11 and rules of procedure. She raised many other questions, but I have time to deal here only with those which are of general interest. Clause 11 will empower the Secretary of State to make rules of procedure for appeals proceedings. The answer to her question is that the rules will be subject to the negative Resolution procedure of this House.
There has been much discussion about adjudicators. The real point here is that there seemed to be some dubiety on the part of some right hon. and hon. Gentlemen about lawyers. As a non-lawyer, I take a very subjective view of this. It is not for me to enter into the argument, except to say that from my investigations at the ports—and I have not been doing this job for any length of time, but through picking the brains of those who have—I do not think that it would be right for the adjudicators to be lawyers. This is not the intention, and this is why I said that a study of the Wilson Report was essential when dealing with the Bill.

Sir G. Nabarro: I confess that I have no knowledge of the law, but I am curious to know how, if the adjudicator

is not to be a lawyer and if the would-be immigrant is represented by a lawyer—he certainly ought to be, in view of the abstruse character of the law—an adjudicator will deal with lawyers pleading or opposing the case of a would-be immigrant.

Mr. Rees: The whole purpose behind the Wilson Report, and the intention of the Bill, in a large respect is to carry out the recommendations of the Report, was that this sort of occasion should not be a legal one. My right hon. Friend and I, on his behalf, on a number of occasions at this moment, in a sense act as adjudicators. Members of Parliament and others bring these cases to our attention—quite properly—at all hours of the day and night. At the moment, it is the politician who happens to be at the Home Office who is doing a job that in future will be done by the adjudicators and the Tribunal. I certainly have not felt in carrying out this task that, because I do not have legal training, I have been unable to do the job.

Mr. John Biggs-Davison: It might be much better and less impracticable if the Home Office continued to carry out this duty.

Mr. Rees: The argument against that was put in the Wilson Report. This is not the point at which to argue that.

Mr. Oakes: The Wilson Committee is quite silent on the qualifications of adjudicators. The only hint it gives is to say that, where there are part-time adjudicators, they ought to be solicitors. How does my hon. Friend reconcile that with his statement about having non-lawyers?

Mr. Rees: I would be the last to say that lawyers should be debarred, but this is not a highly legal matter. I have been trying to think how this could be done.
I have here a letter written to my hon. Friend the Member for Barons Court (Mr. Richard). It is about four pages long and was sent to him in relation to a case of his. I discussed the matter with my hon. Friend earlier today. He said, "Would that that letter could be published, because it typifies the sort of work that immigration officers do at ports and that Home Office officials do, and also illustrates what the adjudicators will be considering". They are not fine


points of law. They are points of fact about passports, whether a passport is forged, whether, under the rules and regulations, under the Commonwealth Immigrants Acts, or under the Aliens Orders, people should be admitted.
My right hon. Friend has decided, with the Lord Chancellor's full agreement, to adhere to the Wilson Committee's recommendation that the appointment of adjudicators should be made by the Secretary of State. There will be about 20 serving full-time and about 30 part-time. It was considered that questions of adjudicators were not ones for the Lord Chancellor. It is the Lord Chancellor's own view, as it was that of the Wilson Committee, that his intervention in the establishment of the appeals system will be more effective if it is limited to the appointment of the Tribunal.
When speaking about the arrangements for bringing appeals before adjudicators within a few hours, the hon. Lady the Member for Devonport referred to the Canadian system. The figure of 200 special inquiry officers in Canada, referred to in paragraph 7 of Appendix V to the Report, includes officers in charge at small ports and is not comparable with our 20 full-time adjudicators. In Britain, 14 out of 15 immigrants arrive at the seven ports where full-time adjudicators will be stationed, which also answers the point raised by the hon. Member for Worcestershire, South (Sir G. Nabarro).
The right hon. Member for Ashford (Mr. Deedes) raised a number of questions. Some of them can be more appropriately dealt with by my writing to him. I know that he has taken a great interest in this matter and has visited ports and talked to people there. He pointed out that the Wilson Report says that 150 fabricated or altered passports were detected during 1966. He asked whether there were more recent figures. During the 12 months ended 30th September, 1968, 176 Commonwealth citizens were found to be travelling on falsified documents. That is a slight increase, but it is only a very small proportion of the total of those who enter.
Granted that we should concentrate on evasions, but to the extent that we do so and forget the facts relating to

the large number of those who enter perfectly honourably, the whole question of race relations is coloured, because we find ourselves looking at Commonwealth citizens and wondering whether they came in illegally. I know that the number who enter illegally is relatively small. However, this does not mean that we should not attend to this matter.
The right hon. Gentleman also raised the question whether Commonwealth visitors should register with the police. My right hon. Friend and I have considered this carefully. The advice we have received from the police is that, even if such a system were acceptable on other grounds, it would not in practice make much contribution to enforcement of control. This is rather different from aliens, who tend not to live in groups or communities. It would be difficult to enforce such a control.

Mr. Deedes: That was not the question I asked. I asked: as this involves embarkation and landing cards, has any check been made on what the pairing up of these cards results in?

Mr. Rees: I will let the right hon. Gentleman have in writing the answer to that point and also the figures for breach of conditions. I do know, however, that the number of Commonwealth citizens who breach their conditions is very small.
Then there was the question of disclosing and information about methods of detecting evasion. Given the Bill as it stands, I think that information would have to be given. We shall have to consider this matter very carefully. I am grateful to the right hon. Gentleman for raising the point, but there are now refined ways of detecting forgeries and it would be foolish of me to publicise information on this.
We have not quite completed our study of fiancées. The question, which is not as simple as it seems, is being considered.
A number of right hon. and hon. Gentlemen raised the question of accommodation at the ports. It will be important to get this right, because already it has been indicated to me that there is talk about houses being made available for immigrants. Therefore, as my right hon. Friend said, it will be advisable for me to develop this at a little more length than he had time to do.
The preparations which have to be made for the introduction of the appeals system include not only the appointment of staff, as is detailed in the Explanatory and Financial Memorandum, but also the provision of premises for the hearing of appeals and the detention of appellants who are not released on bail. At the majority of ports it will be a matter only of hiring premises for hearings when necessary, and the existing facilities for detention should be sufficient. At a few places, principally London Airport, something more will be required. It will be necessary to have secure accommodation in or near London Airport for 40 to 50 passengers at a time, more than double the present number.
Our plan is to provide the additional accommodation on the periphery of the airport in close proximity to the building where the appeals will be heard. There are Government buildings on the former Road Research Laboratory site at Harmondsworth which might be suitable for at least temporary use for this purpose; but the process of conversion and adaptation is bound to take some time. Eventually, it is hoped that purpose-built premises can be provided.
The House may wonder why it is necessary to make provision for the detention of people in custody, since the Bill makes provision for the grant of bail. Whether or not bail is granted in a particular case will be a matter for the adjudicator's discretion. It remains to be seen how that discretion will be exercised. It may well be, however, that where a passenger has to wait only a day or two the adjudicator will think it better that he should remain in custody rather than be set at liberty at a port far from the home of his relatives or friends.
At any rate, whatever proportion of people are released on bail, proper provision for the accommodation of appellants who for one reason or another cannot be released must be made. Under the present law we must make provision at London Airport, and my right hon. Friend would state straightaway that it is not satisfactory even under the present system. We are trying to improve that as well.

Mrs. Renée Short: Does this mean that women will not be sent to Holloway?

How does my hon. Friend intend to treat children who come unaccompanied but who may also to have to lodge appeals?

Mr. Rees: I will state what the position is now, because that is what exercises my hon. Friend's mind.
Under the Commonwealth Immigrants Act, 1962 the Home Secretary's directions limit the period which a passenger may spend in detention quarters at any time to five days. Then he must be transferred to prison custody. As my hon. Friend mentioned last year in the debate on the Expiring Laws Continuance Bill, and before the introduction of this Bill, we have plans for securing the provision of a hostel near London Airport for dealing with the existing situation. But at the moment such institutions as remand homes are used.
It must be made clear that the present situation is not satisfactory. There is no doubt about that. At the airport the officials are trying to do the best they can, but it is because of the unsatisfactory circumstances there that, under the Bill, we intend to provide larger accommodation for dealing with those who experience difficulty on arrival at the ports.

The question of bail will be within the discretion of the adjudicators. It is not for me to comment further on this except to say that I know of the problem for immigration officers or the Ministers when it is said that a person should be allowed to come into the country rather than stay in unsatisfactory quarters. The fact that some people abscond makes it extremely difficult to deal with the genuine cases. I know that in time this sort of question will have to be taken into account under the new system.

The number of cases in which blatant misrepresentations are made to immigration officers to secure an immigrant's admission, although small in relation to the number of genuinely qualified immigrants who seek entry at the ports, is nevertheless disturbing. I stress again, however, that our information at the Home Office is that the number is very small.

We have recently introduced at London Airport arrangements for bringing cases of apparent misrepresentation more quickly to the notice of the police


with a view to proceedings being taken against the people concerned. There are a dozen or so cases in which proceedings are being considered and, obviously, I cannot say what their outcome will be. In a recent case, however, a man and his wife, who were residents of this country, were convicted of misrepresentation and fines of £25 and £10 were imposed. In most cases, it is for the police to decide whether there is sufficient evidence to institute proceedings and for the courts to decide whether the charge is proved and, if so, what penalty is appropriate.

The maximum penalties—and I hope that publicity will be given to this—are a fine of £100 and six months' imprisonment. If the offender is liable to deportation, this also may be recommended. I say that because, again in my brief experience, it is grossly unfair that the fact that £ very small proportion of people offend against the legislation often colours the treatment which is given to genuine people. The fact that the number of prosecutions has increased in recent months will, I hope, serve as a deterrent.

My right hon. Friend, in his opening speech, dealt with the question of the advisory organisation which the Wilson Committee recommended. He has decided that it shall be the composite organisation. I hope that discussions will shortly lake place, because the new organisation will not only deal with welfare, but will give advice—which need not be given by lawyers. There is no need for legal advice in this connection. I can speak from practical experience, because so much of the work that I do is the sort that this appellate organisation will be dealing with.

Dame Joan Vickers: I would like to express my thanks, on behalf of the various organisations, for that decision. It is very helpful.

Mr. Rees: I thank the hon. Lady. I had an interesting meeting last week with the organisations concerned. A large number of voluntary organisations wish to play their part in this necessary work. The hon. Lady has provoked me to saying one thing more. Independence there must be, but accountability must be maintained in respect of money that is spent as a result of being voted by this House.
I now come to the question of entry certificates. The Wilson Committee was well aware of the problems which arise when the eligibility of an immigrant for admission has to be determined for the first time at the port of entry—for example, problems of time, accommodation, strain on immigrants and the burden of work falling on the immigration service. The introduction of an appeals system will not in itself solve these problems. My right hon. Friend and I have been looking closely at entry certificates. Important as they are, they must not be thought to be the answer to all the problems that arise.
The Wilson Committee, nevertheless, saw the only remedy as being the wider use by immigrants of the entry certificate procedure. I understand that the Joint Council for the Welfare of Immigrants will use publicity and advice in the country of origin to get intending immigrants to know the full facts of the situation. The House may be interested to know that my predecessor in this office, my hon. Friend the hon. Member for Dover (Mr. Ennals), wrote to the editors of all papers which circulate in immigrant communities asking them to publicise information about entry certificates.
There is an immigration leaflet for intending immigrants which is mentioned in paragraph 179 of the Wilson Report. It encourages them to apply for entry certificates. These are distributed through passport issuing offices and airline offices and are available from British posts abroad. Some posts also produce their own material in the local language and the Indian Government encloses in newly-issued passports a slip advising immigrants to the United Kingdom to obtain entry certificates. Pakistan International Airlines issues similar advice to its intending passengers.

Sir G. Nabarro: Will the hon. Gentleman reply to my specific question? There are very large numbers of Pakistanis who seek to come into this country. Very large numbers are carried by Pakistani Airlines. Why is it not possible to arrange with Pakistani Airlines that no ticket will ever be sold to this country unless the would-be immigrant produces proof at the point of embarkation that leave has been given to enter the United Kingdom?

Mr. Rees: To take the precise point of Pakistanis Airlines, they are very good and helpful in this respect. I am answering the question of publicity in the countries concerned. My right hon. Friend cannot, however, tell independent Governments what to do. When people go to our posts abroad and discuss entry to this country, they are informed about the benefits of an entry certificate. [Interruption.] I am not dealing with the point of making them compulsory. We do what we can.
I fully agree with all that has been said. The entry certificate system would ease the problem because the difficulties would be, not at the port of entry, but abroad. There is no disagreement here. The Government's mind about this is still open; the Select Committee is looking at it, but there are difficulties. At least, there is the practical point that there would still be evasion. Even when entry certificates were obtained, there would still be forgeries. The hon. Member for Worcestershire, South shakes his head. He may be an innocent in this respect—

Sir G. Nabarro: The hon. Gentleman must not put a gloss on my words. I am not shaking my head about the matter of prospective or possible forgery. I am saying that when a would-be immigrant comes here, is refused admission and is returned to his point of origin, somebody has to pay the air fare back. The Minister says that it would be Pakistani Airlines. Would it not be better, however, for the Government to arrange with the airline in the first place that no booking to this country would be accepted unless a certificate of entry had been granted? That would solve the whole problem.

Mr. Rees: It is not possible to tell people in other countries what to do. They are independent. At present they suffer, because if they bring in somebody who is turned back, they have to carry him back. There are difficulties in doing this.
The most important point that I would bring to the hon. Member's notice is that if we were to make entry certificates compulsory an amendment would be necessary to the 1962 Act. The hon. Gentleman is saying that there should be entry certificates for Commonwealth

immigrants, but is he saying that we should then treat all people who come in equally? One of his hon. Friends has said that aliens and Commonwealth immigrants should be treated alike. In these circumstances, there would have to be visas for aliens. Visas were done away with at least 25 years ago, but would have to be reintroduced if we were to make the requirements the same for both Commonwealth citizens and aliens. It is not an easy matter. The Government accept, however, that the more that people have entry certificates, the easier it would be. There is no doubt about that. The argument is about the means of arranging it. I must, however, make the corollary that it would not mean that there would be no cases of forgery at London Airport or anywhere else; neither would it mean fewer people coming in.

Mr. Deedes: Is not the point at issue raised by my hon. Friend the Member for Worcestershire, South (Sir G. Nabarro), and described in paragraph 40 of the Wilson Report, that some carrier companies have agreed to insist on entry certificates, but others, in other parts of the Commonwealth, have refused because of competition? Is the position any different now, and, if so, can we improve it? That is the point.

Mr. Rees: The right hon. Gentleman puts the situation as it is now. One of the problems is that when an airline cooperates with us and says, "We will only carry people having entry certificates" passengers then go to somebody else; there is competition. The right hon. Gentleman is absolutely right. The day of the British Raj and the Empire are over. We are not in a position to tell people what to do.
We are fully aware of the value of entry certificates for settlement. I asked the hon. Gentleman a question, because I think that it would be foolish to have entry certificates or visas in general for the 3 million visitors who come in. The hon. Gentleman says "No"? He should, then, be more explicit in what he is saying.

Sir G. Nabarro: It is a matter of administration, and of what we ask any entrant into the United Kingdom to do, and that is, to produce one of two things, either a return ticket to his point of


origin, in which case he is a visitor or tourist—aid he has got to go back if he is a visitor. [Laughter.] It is no good hon. Gentlemen opposite laughing at me. He has got to go back if he is a visitor. Or a work voucher to come in. One or the other. That is quite explicit. I will argue it in depth in Committee.

Mr. Rees: I look forward to that. I also look forward to seeing the Report of the Select Committee. The hon. Gentleman prides himself on his administrative as opposed to his legal ability. All I would say to the hon. Gentleman is that we have advice given to us by people who have considered this matter in detail.
One last word on the question of immigration officers. Praise has been given to them. The number of difficult cases which arise, at London Airport in particular, imposes a heavy burden on the immigration service, so I regret it when attacks are made on them in the newspapers. I will paraphrase my view by saying that if there is a disagreement with policy, then it is the politicians who are the ones to attack—that, in a sense, is what we are paid for—not the people carrying out the job at the ports. I have been there, and they do an extremely?

difficult job, and they do it well, and the Wilson Committee praises them for that. It would be very interesting if one could publish—it is not possible—'the very difficult cases which have to be dealt with.

The Bill, when it becomes an Act, will give a new sense of security and protection at the ports. It will lighten the Ministers' burden—because they, are, in effect, the adjudicators at the moment. I am not sure whether those who, over the years, have been very much in support of such a Bill, and who believe that the decisions will be more liberal, are right. In my brief experience I believe that it is the politicians—of all parties—who tend to be, perhaps, more liberal, maybe because they have the right to raise cases in the House as people dealing with the questions at the ports do not. Perhaps it is unfashionable to praise politicians, particularly among politicians, but that is the thought I have.

I commend the Bill to the House.

Question put, That the Bill be now read a Second time:—

The House divided: Ayes 170, Noes 24.

Division No. 48.]
AYES
7.35 p.m.


Abse, Leo
Davies, S. O. (Merthyr)
Haseldine, Norman


Allaun, Frank (Salford, E.)
Delargy, Hugh
Heffer, Eric S.


Aldritt, Walter
Dempsey, James
Henig, Stanley


Ashton, Joe (Bassetlaw)
Dewar, Donald
Horner, John


Atkins, Ronald (Preston, N.)
Dickens, James
Houghton, Rt. Hn. Douglas


Atkinson, Norman (Tottenham)
Dobson, Ray
Howarth, Harry (Wellingborough)


Bagier, Gordon A. T.
Doig, Peter
Howarth, Robert (Bolton, E.)


Baxter, William
Driberg, Tom
Howell, Denis (Small Heath)


Beaney, Alan
Dunn, James A.
Hughes, Emrys (Ayrshire, S.)


Bessell, Peter
Dunnett, Jack
Hunter, Adam


Bidwell, Sydney
Dunwoody, Mrs. Gwyneth (Exeter)
Hynd, John


Bishop, E. S.
Eadie, Alex
Irvine, Sir Arthur (Edge Hill)


Blackburn, F.
Edelman, Maurice
Johnston, Russell (Inverness)


Booth, Albert

Jones, Rt. Hn. Sir Elwyn (W. Ham, S.)


Boyden James
Edwards, Robert (Bilston)
Jones, J. Idwal (Wrexham)


Braddock, Mrs. E. M.
Edwards, William (Merioneth)
Jones, T. Alec (Rhondda, West)


Bradley Tom
Ellis, John
Judd, Frank


Bradley, Tom
Evans, Fred (Caerphilly)



Brown, Hugh D (G'gow, Provan)
Evans, loan L. (Birm'h'm, Yardley)
Kelley, Richard Kenyon, Clifford


Brown, Bob)(N 's' tle-upon-Tyne, W.)
Fernyhough, E.
Lawson, George


Buchan, Norman
Finch, Harold
Lee, Rt. Hn. Frederick (Newton)


Buchanan, Richard (G'gow, Sp'burn)
Fitch, Alan (Wigan)
Loughlin, Charles


Butler, Herbert (Hackney, C.)
Fitt, Gerard (Belfast, W.)
Lubbock, Eric


Callaghan, Rt. Un. James
Foot, Michael (Ebbw Vale)
McBride, Nell


Carter-Jones, Lewis
Fowler, Gerry
McCann, John


Chapman, Donald
Galpern, Sir Myer
MacColi, James


Coe, Denis
Ginsburg, David
McGuire, Michael


Coleman, Donald
Gray, Dr. Hugh (Yarmouth)
Mackenzie, A lasdair (Ross&Crom'ty)


Crawshaw, 'Richard
Gregory, Arnold
Mackintosh, John P.


Cullen, Mrs. Alice
Griffiths, David (Rother Valley)
Maclennan, Robert


Dalyell, Tam
Griffiths, Eddie (Brightside)
MacMillan, Malcolm (Western Isles)


Davies, G. Elfed (Rhondda, E.)
Griffiths, Will (Exchange)
McMillan, Tom (Glasgow, C.)


Davies, Dr. Ernest (Stretford)
Hannan, William
McNamara, J. Kevin


Davies, Harold (Leek)
Harper, Joseph
MacPherson, Malcolm


Davies, Ifor (Gower)
Harrison, Walter (Wakefield)
Mahon. Peter (Preston, S.)




Mallalieu, J. P. W.(Huddersfield, E.)
Pearson, Arthur (Pontypridd)
Swain, Thomas


Manuel, Archie
Peart, Rt. Hn. Fred
Taverne, Dick


Mapp, Charles
Perry, George H. (Nottingham, S.)
Thomas, Rt. Hn. George


Marks, Kenneth
Price, Thomas (Westhoughton)
Tinn, James


Mason, Rt. Hn. Roy
Probert, Arthur
Urwin, T. W.


Mendelson, John
Rankin, John
Varley, Eric G.


Millan, Bruce
Rees, Merlyn
Wainwright, Edwin (Dearne Valley)


Miller, Dr. M. S.
Roberts, Albert (Normanton)
Wallace, George


Morgan, Elystan (Cardiganshire)
Rodgers, William (Stockton)
Watkins, Tudor (Brecon & Radnor)


Morris, Alfred (Wythenshawe)
Rose, Paul
Wellbeloved, James


Morris, Charles R. (Openshaw)
Rowlands, E.
White, Mrs. Eirene


Morris, John (Aberavon)
Ryan, John
Whitlock, William


Moyle, Roland
Shaw, Arnold (Ilford, S.)
Wilkins, W. A.


Newens, Stan
Shore, Rt. Hn. Peter (Stepney)
Willey, Rt. Hn. Frederick


Oakes, Gordon
Short, Rt. Hn. Edward (N'c'tle-u-Tyne)
Williams, Alan Lee (Hornchurch)


Ogden, Eric
Short, Mrs. Renée (W'hampton, N. E.)
Williams, Clifford (Abertillery)


O'Malley, Brian
Silkin, Rt. Hn. John (Deptford)
Wilson, William (Coventry, S.)


Oram, Albert E.
Silkin, Hn. S. C. (Dulwich)
Winstanley, Dr. M. P.


Orme, Stanley
Silverman, Julius
Woof, Robert


Owen, Will (Morpeth)
Slater, Joseph



Page, Derek (King's Lynn)
Snow, Julian
TELLERS FOR THE AYES:


Pannen, Rt. Hn. Charles
Spriggs, Leslie
Mr. J. D. Concannon and


Park, Trevor
Steel, David (Roxburgh)
Mr. Charles Grey.


Parker, John (Dagenham)
Steele, Thomas (Dunbartonshire, W.)






NOES



Alison, Michael (Barkston, Ash)
Gurden, Harold
Taylor. Edward M.(G'gow, Cathcart)


Allason, James (Hemel Hempstead)
Hiley, Joseph
Taylor, Frank (Moss Side)


Baker, W. H. K. (Banff)
Jennings, J. C. (Burton)
Teeling, Sir William


Biggs-Davison, John
King, Evelyn (Dorset, S.)
Waddington, David


Boardman, Tom (Leicester, S. W.)
McMaster, Stanley
Williams, Donald (Dudley)


Bullus, Sir Eric
McNair-Wilson. Patrick



Deedes, Rt. Hn. W. F. (Ashford)
Maude, Angus
TELLERS FOR THE NOES:


Elliot, Capt. Walter (Carshalton)
Maxwell-Hyslop, R. J.
Mr. Ronald Bell and


Errington, Sir Eric
Powell, Rt. Hn. J. Enoch
Sir Gerald Nabarro.


Glover, Sir Douglas

Bill accordingly read a Second time.

Bill committed to a Standing Committee pursuant to Standing Order No. 40 (Committal of Bills).

Orders of the Day — IMMIGRATION APPEALS [MONEY]

Queen's Recommendation having been signified—

Resolved,
That, for the purposes of any Act of the present Session to confer rights of appeal against the exercise by the Secretary of State and officers acting under his instructions of their powers in respect of the admission into and removal from the United Kingdom of persons to whom section 1 or 6 of the Commonwealth Immigrants Act, 1962, applies and to enable provision to be made by Order in Council for conferring corresponding rights of appeal on aliens, it is expedient to authorise the payment out of moneys provided by Parliament of any expenditure of the Secretary of State under or in consequence of any provision of that Act.—[Mr. Merlyn Rees.]

FOREIGN COMPENSATION BILL

Not amended (in the Standing Committee), considered.

Clause 2

AMENDMENTS OF FOREIGN COMPENSATION ACT, 1950

7.40 p.m.

The Under-Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs (Mr. William Whitlock): I beg to move Amendment No. 1, in page 3, line 30, at end insert:
(4) An Order in Council under the said section 3 may confer power on the Foreign Compensation Commission to determine any question as to the construction or interpretation of any provision with respect to claims falling to be determined by them which is included in any Order made under that section after the passing of this Act; and any determination of the Commission by virtue of this subsection shall be included among the determinations to which section 4(4) of the Foreign Compensation Act, 1950 (determinations of the Commission not to be questioned in courts of law) applies.

Mr. Speaker: It will be for the convenience of the House to consider also


Amendment No. 2, in page 3, line 31, leave out 'Foreign Compensation Act' and insert 'said Act of'.

Mr. Whitlock: The effect of this addition to this Bill would be to widen its subsidiary purpose of making certain amendments on points of detail to the Foreign Compensation Act, 1950.
The reason for the short notice is as follows. On 17th December, that is to say after the Bill had been reported out of Committee, the House of Lords—sitting in its judicial capacity—by a majority of three to two, delivered a judgment which, if the law remains unchanged, has serious implications for the future work of the Foreign Compensation Commission.
In the Government's view, the difficulty which has been shown to exist should be removed, as I hope to show, and this Bill, which happens by coincidence to be before the House, is the appropriate vehicle for doing it. I must make it clear at the outset that this Amendment would not affect the successful plaintiff in the case in question: the Amendment is not retrospective.
Hon. Members may remember that in setting up the Foreign Compensation Commission in 1950 Parliament provided, in Section 4(4) of the Foreign Compensation Act, 1950, that:
The determination by the Commission of any application made to them under this Act shall not be called in question in any court of law.
The provision was approved without controversy in this House, as well as in another place. Parliament reaffirmed the intention of the Act of 1950 when in 1958 the Foreign Compensation Commission was expressly excluded from certain sections of the Tribunals and Inquiries Act, 1958. In particular, the Commission was excluded from Section 11 whereby provisions similar to that in Section 4 (4) of the Foreign Compensation Act were deprived of substantial effect, in the light of the Franks Report on Administrative Tribunals. As the Tribunals and Inquires Bill was originally introduced into Parliament, it would have applied to the Commission. But, on reconsideration, it was amended in Committee so as to make a special exception excluding the Commission in view of its special character and, once

again, in 1958 as in 1950, this was approved without controversy.
In the recent case of Anisminic Limited v. the Foreign Compensation Commission and Another, their Lordships held that the Courts were entitled to review the Commission's interpretation of the relevant Order, on the ground that the Commission had misconstrued it and had thereby exceeded its jurisdiction, with the result that its determination was a nullity and not protected from judicial review by Section 4 (4) of the Act of 1950.
In practice, however, the Commission cannot avoid interpreting the Orders under which it carries out the distributions entrusted to it. The judgment, therefore, would make it possible for the Commission's determinations, made in perfect good faith and after the most careful deliberation, to be challenged in a wide range of cases. This is contrary to what the Government believe to have been the intention of Parliament and would lead to unfortunate consequences.
The task of the Commission is to determine claims and arrange for the distribution on a rateable basis to successful claimants of what are nearly always finite "lump sums", such as the assets which are to be made available to successful claimants under Clause 1 of this Bill. These "lump sums" are received either in the form of cash from foreign Governments, or are raised by the disposal of foreign assets in this country—consequential upon an Agreement.
It cannot be judged with any degree of certainty what the share attributable to each succesful applicant will be until all applications, or at any rate those of any magnitude, have been disposed of. Consequently if there is to be a risk that determinations of the Commission may be challenged in the courts and perhaps taken, as was the Anisminic case, right up to the House of Lords, which as hon. Members know is a very lengthy business, the Commission will have to wait for substantial periods, until all risk of litigation has passed, before they can pay anything like a final dividend, or perhaps any worthwhile dividend at all, to successful claimants.
If the Commission were to take a different course and proceed to distribute the


fund as expeditiously as in the past without regard to the risk of successful litigation, judgment might be given against the Commission after the relevant Fund had been exhausted. This would inevitably lead to the difficult problem of how to satisfy the judgment, and to pressure for the successful litigant to be paid out of public funds. But the source of compensation for the seizure of British property abroad should be the foreign Government concerned and not the British taxpayer.
In these circumstances, Her Majesty's Government have decided that the proper course is to ask the House to agree to the insertion into the Bill of this Amendment. I would invite the House's attention to two features of this Amendment.
First, as I made clear at the outset, it is in no sense retrospective. It would apply only to distributions begun in the future after the passing of this Act; it would not in any way affect the case of Anisminic Limited which the Foreign Compensation Commission will consider again in the light of the recent judgment.
Secondly, it would not prejudice the exercise of jurisdiction by the courts in the case of an alleged failure to observe the rules of natural justice, or a complaint, for instance, of some fundamental error of procedure. Nobody would wish to do that, though, in the case of a Tribunal manned by lawyers of such distinction as is the Foreign Compensation Commission, it is hard to conceive of an occasion arising for an action to be brought upon such grounds.
I am of course aware of the feeling in this House, and, I think I may add, in the legal profession, that generally speaking the citizen should not be precluded from having recourse to the courts in respect of a decision of a Tribunal in cases of the kind provided for in the Tribunals and Inquiries Act, 1958.
I must, however, point out that this Amendment will bear only on the Foreign Compensation Commission and that, as was recognised by Parliament in 1950 and again in 1958, the work of that Commission is of a special character. It operates on a somewhat different plane from tribunals which are constituted to decide the questions affecting the rights and privileges of subjects of the Crown.

It is indeed a well-established principle that, until an Order under the Foreign Compensation Act is made, no individual claimant has any right to share in foreign compensation received by the Crown from a foreign government, the distribution of which lies essentially within the discretion of the Crown. This is recognised in the well-known case of Civilian War Claimants versus the King, in which the House of Lords in 1931 decided that an Article of the Treaty of Versailles about Germany's payment of compensation in respect of British claimants' losses in the First War did not give them a right to sue the Crown in our courts.
Moreover, as I have already explained, the Commission's operations in dividing up pro rata between successful claimants a finite compensation fund are such that there can be no finality until all the cases have been determined. This is a very real and practical consideration, which distinguishes the work of the Foreign Compensation Commission from that of other tribunals.
Moreover, the costs and incidental expenses of defending proceedings before the courts would have to come out of the Compensation Fund concerned and thereby reduce the dividend which can be paid to successful claimants. There are already safeguards for the claimant in the way in which the Commission operates. All its determinations are, for instance, provisional and subject to a thorough procedure of review.
I am moving this Amendment on practical grounds with an eye to the interests of claimants as a whole. In the case of the distribution envisaged by this Bill, the period since the claimants lost their property is already in most cases nearly 30 years. The Foreign and Commonwealth Office has received many pathetic letters from people of small means badly in need of the modest sums which they hope will be awarded them in this distribution. Hon. Members will, I think, agree that it would not be right to impose a further substantial delay before the distribution could be completed, because, perhaps, a single claimant chose to take his case outside the existing review machinery and put it before the courts.

Mr. Richard Wood: The hon. Gentleman was kind enough to write to me last week offering a brief explanation of the reasons which have led the


Government, at what he acknowledged was a rather late stage, to decide to extend the purposes of the Bill. He has given us a fuller explanation now, for which, having read through the Amendment five or six times with a gradually dawning comprehension, I am extremely grateful, but which we would be wise to study carefully before committing ourselves either to its full acceptance or its rejection. Obviously there will be opportunities for further comment to be made in another place, but there are one or two matters which I would like to bring up now.
The first of them is a general point. It is to question the desirability of Governments yielding to the temptation to transform conveniently current Bills into vehicles for a new policy which has never been discussed until a few minutes before this House parts with the Bill. In spite of the hon. Gentleman's closing words, the matter before us has nothing to do with the Anglo-Soviet Agreement, which has been the kernel of our discussions up to date. Anisminio Ltd. was operating a long way from the Baltic—in the Sinai Peninsular.
I was not always able to resist the temptation which has overcome the hon. Gentleman, but even these personal precedents do not make it an admirable practice. These very late insertions make it difficult for the Opposition to offer any useful advice.
I hope that I understood the hon. Gentleman's explanation correctly. As I understand it, the Foreign Compensation Act, 1950, precludes the courts from calling into question a determination of the Commission. In that sense, as I am sure the hon. Gentleman will agree, such a determination always was and is final. However, the recent judgment to which he referred has found that a determination of the Commission was a nullity and, therefore, did not exist. The Government's view, to which they are now seeking by the Amendment to give legislative effect, is that the judicial character of the Foreign Compensation Commission and the duties imposed on it should preclude not only an appeal against the determination itself, which I understand has always been the case, but also should preclude an appeal against the status of the determination.
My feeling is that we should try to aim at a balance. I am not wholly convinced at present that the Government's Amendment achieves that balance satisfactorily. The balance should be between preserving the substance of the Commission's decisions from the danger of subsequent appeal, which has been done in the past, and at the same time safeguarding the right of a claimant to question the validity of a decision which, in the present instance, in the majority opinion of noble Lords, was not a decision at all. I think that the hon. Gentleman will acknowledge the need of my noble Friends, my hon. Friends and myself to give the matter very careful thought. I am sure that he will agree and sympathise with our intention to return to the matter later, possibly in another place, if our anxieties remain.

8.0 p.m.

Sir John Foster: The Amendment seeks to overrule a decision of the House of Lords that where the Commission makes a mistake in interpreting the Order the result is a nullity. The Amendment is saying that if the Commission makes a mistake no one can challenge it. The hon. Gentleman says that the Amendment is justified because the House of Commons and the other place, both in 1950 and 1958, decided that no decision of the Foreign Compensation Commission should be queried.
First, I query his premise. As the 1950 Act is drafted, the House of Lords has decided that Parliament did not do that. We must assume that Parliament intended to do what the House of Lords in that essential decision has said that it did. I am not very hopeful of this argument appealing to a House of Commons which passed an Order in Council deciding that Prince Frederick of Prussia had lost his case when he had won it, nor a House of Commons that decided that Burma h Oil had lost its case when it had won it. This is just another instance of the House of Commons deciding that where the Commission has made a mistake in its interpretation of an Order in Council that it has to stand.
I think that the House of Commons and the other place in 1950 and 1958 decided that what my right hon. Friend the Member for Bridlington (Mr. Wood) calls the substance of the claim, the amount, cannot be queried except where


the Foreign Compensation Commission makes a mistake about the interpretation of the Regulations and Order in Council under which it is operating.
The hon. Gentleman brings in aid what I may call several utilitarian arguments. He says that if the Foreign Compensation Commission's decisions are queried by claimants it will not be possible to arrive at a finite distribution. Literally speaking, that is true, because if we do not know whether Claimant A is entitled to £10,000 or £15,000, depending on the interpretation of the Order, it will not be possible to distribute that last £5,000 until the House of Lords, if the matter goes there, has made a decision.
I suggest that that can be quite easily overcome in a practical way. It is common ground that the Foreign Compensation Commission cannot give a finite dividend until all cases have been decided. When the last case is decided, it is quite easy for the Foreign Compensation Commission to take the number of cases, which will be very few indeed, because they have to rest on the claim that the Foreign Compensation Commission has misinterpreted and made an error in law about the regulations, and put down, if the Foreign Compensation Commission is right, that £X will be available for distribution. If it is wrong, and it loses every case on appeal, it will be £X minus £Y. However, the final dividend will not alter very much; it will not be a big sum.
It is theoretically true that if cases are taken as far as the House of Lords, until the House of Lords makes its final decision in the last case it will not be possible to give a finite dividend. But this objection is without substance.
The hon. Gentleman quite wrongly put his argument as though it applied only to the Latvian, etc., payments. I have disclosed my interest before. I have an interest in certain of the results which are governed by the Bill. If the hon. Gentleman had said that one result would be that possibly these people who have been waiting for 30 years will have to wait a little longer for their finite dividend, that would be all right. But the Bill affects a large number of claims to the Foreign Compensation Commission which have nothing to do with the Latvian bonds.
Does the House realise that the decision in the House of Lords which gave extra compensation to a claimant because he said the Foreign Compensation Commission had made such an error that the result was a nullity, would have lost his case if the Amendment had been in force? It has not been retrospective concerning Burmah Oil and Prince Frederick, and I respect the Government for that; but I do not respect whoever was responsible for the other two cases. It must be said that those on the other side voted against Prince Frederick without having heard the issue because they were outside the Chamber. But it is true that this claimant was only accorded his just desserts, because the Foreign Compensation Commission had made a grievous mistake. In future, anybody who suffers from such a mistake will have no claim in law at all, and this is a denial of natural justice.
A grave criticism of the English legislative system is that it is willing to entrust decisions to lawyers who may make any mistake they like and cannot be brought to appeal. That is a very bad principle because, unconsciously, the tribunal is less careful about its decisions. Also, it may have subconscious prejudices. All who practise in the courts—and here I appeal to the Solicitor-General—know that judges have unconscious prejudices. An advocate on one side could get the Foreign Compensation Commission to decide in May this year that black is white. It would not matter, because if the Amendment was passed the Commission would be immune. It is a fundamental principle of justice that no tribunal should be free to make this kind of mistake without being subject to appeal.
It is a different matter when it comes to quantum and matters of fact; for example, where people say a farm is worth so much and there is evidence on both sides. It is all right to say that a decision of the tribunal about a matter of fact of that kind is not subject to appeal. Of course, it would be subject to appeal if it had no evidence the other way and it thought of a sum itself. But here we have a tribunal which is free to make any mistake and, having made that mistake, it is not subject to appeal. What would be the feeling of an hon. Member if someone came to him and


said, "I have a claim before the Foreign Compensation Commission. It is obviously right, but the Commission has decided against me. Because this Amendment was passed dealing with the Latvian, etc. claims. I have no redress."
The whole tendency throughout the world has been to allow people to query the decisions of tribunals. The United States has an excellent court of claims procedure which allows a litigant to criticise or bring to appeal administrative decisions. I appreciate that the right hon. Gentleman has said that Parliament thought that this was a good principle in 1950 and again in 1958, but I query his premise that it thought that in this case there was no right of appeal—and the House of Lords, at least, has said that that view is right.
The House of Commons, once again following the Burmah Oil and Prince Frederick examples, is being asked to follow a course which is contrary to justice. We are to have this tribunal and whatever it says is to be right. It can go off its head provided it follows the procedure. It can make any decisions it likes about the interpretation of an Order in Council. It can put a "not" in and find justification for any interpretation of any wording. If we take Maxwell's Interpretation of Statutes we can put a "not" in and say that it means the opposite. A well 100 feet deep was held to be a building 60 feet high. There are hundreds of these decisions, and the Foreign Compensation Commission can do anything it likes in this respect.
The Commission naturally had its own methods of thinking. In the past I have thought some of its decisions to be wrong, but not wrong enough to try this method of attack and to say that its decision was so wrong that it made the case a nullity. It is surely wrong to ask the House to agree to an Amendment which will mean that a decision which, on any ordinary legal interpretation, is a nullity, shall none the less stand—in other words, to make nullities valid.
I appeal to hon. Members on both sides of the House, because I do not have much confidence in either side on this subject. This is an all-party appeal. I cannot believe that, with all that has

gone on since the Burmah Oil case, it can be right to agree to the Amendment. If the Amendment is agreed to, I hope that the matter will be seriously debated in another place and a thorough examination will be made of what I consider to be the specious argument of the Government about the finite distribution.
It is a disingenuous argument to say that these people have been waiting for 30 years and we should not make them wait even longer; they will not have to wait any longer for the interim dividends. The waiting will arise in respect of the last, finite dividend. I suggest that it would be much better if the Amendment were not accepted.

8.15 p.m.

Mr. R. J. Maxwell-Hyslop: I agree entirely with what my hon. and learned Friend the Member for Northwich (Sir J. Foster) has said. I do not have the advantage of his legal training and experience, but I have had the advantage, if it can be so termed, of dealing with many constituency cases over some time. What appals me—and this is a feeling that the Amendment accentuates—is that there is no appeal from the maladministration of the Foreign Compensation Commission.
The Parliamentary Commissioner for Administration states categorically that he has no authority to inquire into the maladministration of the Commission. I wrote and asked him, and that is what he replied. When my party was in office Ministers from the Foreign Office accepted responsibility for the maladministration of the Commission, and when we wrote to them about such maladministration they did something about it. We got detailed and intelligent answers to our letters. The present Government apparently do not accept responsibility for such maladministration; they just say that the Commission is an independent one and that we should deal with it. If the Government do not accept responsibility for this maladministration and the Parliamentary Commissioner, by law, is not allowed to investigate such maladministration, and the courts are not allowed to do so either, to whom may the injured citizen appeal?

Sir J. Foster: Nobody.

Mr. Maxwell-Hyslop: On the contrary; the injured citizen can appeal—to the Foreign Compensation Commission, which then sits in judgment in its own case. Hon. Members will not be surprised to learn that that judgment is invariably that its own decisions are quite correct. What a travesty of justice! I wonder whether, when we passed the Parliamentary Commissioner Act, we realised that bodies of this kind were being put outside its scope.
That is not all; the Commission can appoint other bodies. It can delegate to them, de facto if not de jure its authority. It can appoint firms of assessors like Toplis and Harding to determine claims on its behalf, and will then take up any decision made by those firms.
Persons are not allowed to challenge the basis on which such private firms allocate their overheads between various claims. I have a constituent named Whitfield who has been grossly misused by Toplis and Harding and has no redress. His assets were first sequestrated in Egypt and then de-sequestrated. The Government make a small amount of compensation available to cover these eventualities but Toplis and Harding have swallowed up almost all of Mr. Whitfield's in administration charges. This cannot be challenged. This is not hypothetical injustice but real injustice. It has occurred and is still occurring, and there is no redress at all unless the courts of justice are allowed to provide it.
It is to prevent the citizen having that redress that the Government now invite the House to agree to this scandalous Amendment. It is scandalous, because it makes a body the appellate judge, and not just the judge in its own cause. That is scandalous if, at the same time, we deny the opportunity for any further appeal or redress, which is precisely what the Government are doing.
We can overlook some of the other rather shoddy things in this rather shoddy Bill, but this is a point that I would like to think the Government overlooked. I find it difficult to believe that this Government would willingly bring about this situation. Perhaps the well of my charity is too deep. Perhaps the Government did intend to bring this about. If they did, it brings nothing but discredit and contempt upon them.
Unfortunately, it is not the members of the Government who will suffer from this injustice. I do not know how many hon. or right hon. Members are present who have ever suffered an injustice of this kind, but judging from the almost empty benches opposite—there are only two backbenchers there—apparently the Government side is not interested in this sort of injustice. Why compound it? Why deny access to the courts? The hon. Gentleman was saying in effect, "It is more convenient to administer unjustly than to ensure that one administers justly. As it is more convenient, we will ask the House to approve this course. After all, if an appeal to the courts is allowed, they may do what is just and this might be administratively inconvenient. We do not want to suffer inconvenience, and therefore such an appeal should be denied." We should not allow this. We should not listen to a Minister asking us to embody this in a Bill lest, peradventure, there should be open to the citizen the redress which he should have.
I repeat: the Foreign Compensation Commission is judge and appeal court in its own cause. If the Government welsh on responsibility for their activities and the Parliamentary Commissioner is refused power to investigate them, and then a Minister asks us to remove the last stop remaining to the courts, the power to investigate maladministration, injustice and incompetence, we are condemning a small number of individuals. It is not a large number, but it does not matter if it is only one or even if the matter is hypothetical. The principle is exactly the same. It is this sort of woolly and shoddy proposition which is being offered to a House of Commons which takes far too little interest in these matters these days which calls from me the bitterest protest which I can summon up.

Mr. Whitlock: I am grateful to the right hon. Member for Bridlington (Mr. Wood) for saying that the Opposition will study the Amendment thoroughly and that their main comments will be reserved for the debate in another place. When they do study the matter, I think that they will find that comments such as those made by the hon. Member for Tiverton (Mr. Maxwell-Hyslop) are totally unwarranted.
The right hon. Gentleman said that the Amendment has nothing to do with the Baltic claims. I readily agree. As I said in moving the Amendment, this arises from the fact that, for certain subsidiary purposes, making Amendments on points of detail to the Foreign Compensation Act, 1950, is inherent in this Bill. For that reason, we are making use on this occasion, since the judgment of the Lords comes at this time, when the Bill is going through the House, to amend the Bill.
I can understand the right hon. Gentleman's feeling that the Amendment has been tabled rather late in the day, and I have sympathy with him, but this is caused by circumstances beyond the Government's control. I agree also that we must preserve a balance between the ability of the Foreign Compensation Commission to carry out its work expeditiously and the right of judicial review. The predominant view of the judges who considered this case was that, where an inferior tribunal acted beyond its jurisdiction, no provision of this kind could oust the inherent power of the courts to intervene. If the tribunal went beyond its proper field, its decision was a nullity. It was admitted, further, that the distinction between a decision within the jurisdiction and an error going beyond jurisdiction was an extremely fine one.
The Government's view happens to coincide with those expressed by one of the judges in the Court of Appeal, Lord Justice Russell, who said:
In all mundane matters requiring decision or adjudication there must as a practical matter be an appropriate level at which a question must be finally resolved. In the particular field now under review, it does not seem to me in any way inappropriate that the Commission should be at that level; and that was the view of the Legislature when the Tribunals and Inquiries Act, 1958, was enacted. In substance the Executive is dealing broadly with matters not strictly matters of right, and the time-consuming precision of the ordinary judicial processes may well be out of place. In terms (now no doubt out-dated) of field artillery, a quadrant elevation to the nearest 25 yards is a work of supererogation if you are working off a one-inch map. Moreover, if it were to appear to the Executive that in a particular case injustice had been done, correction by Order in Council is available, subject only to approval by Parliament.

Mr. Maxwell-Hyslop: As someone who was a Gunner, may I tell the hon.

Gentleman that quadrant elevation is always in terms of degrees rather than yards?

Mr. Whitlock: I was not a Gunner, but I assume from this quotation that Lord Justice Russell was.
The general power of the courts to supervise inferior tribunals continues, in spite of this Amendment. What the Amendment does is define more precisely the field which is remitted to the Foreign Compensation Commission. It may be thought that, in the particular case, the intervention of the courts by putting right a wrong decision served a useful purpose. The Government would not, of course, deny that, on fine points, the highest legal authorities might be at variance with the Commission on those rare occasions when the Department responsible for the Order in Council and the Government draftsmen, whose skills the House always so greatly admires, might have failed to make their intentions crystal clear.
But the interests of claimants as a whole require finality in these matters and what the claimants want is the speediest practicable distribution, together with the guarantee that their cases are decided in a judicial manner and by competent persons. Given the high standing of the members appointed by the Lord Chancellor to the Commission, it is appropriate that the final decision should be taken at that level. That was the intention embodied in the 1950 Act and the Tribunals and Inquiries Act, 1958, and the present Amendment gives effect more clearly to the intention which the House expressed on both those occasions.

Amendment agreed to.
Further Amendment made: No. 2, in page 3, line 31, leave out "Foreign Compensation Act" and insert "said Act of".—[Mr. Whitlock.]

Mr. Whitlock: I beg to move, That the Bill be now read the Third time.
This short Bill, which in form is largely technical, was not amended in Committee, and apart from the addition to its subsidiary purposes which we have just made, the text that I am asking the House to pass today is identical with that before us on Second Reading.
The primary purpose of the Bill, I would remind the House, is to take action consequential on the Agreement concluded with the Soviet Government on 5th January, 1968 for the Settlement of Mutual Financial and Property Claims.
The Bill would enable assets in this country which formerly belonged to persons resident or carrying on business in the Baltic States and other territories ceded to the Soviet Union during or just after the war to be used for the payment of compensation for losses suffered by British persons and interests in those regions. These losses were in the main suffered nearly 30 years ago and, by passing the Bill, we should be taking a major step towards the day, for which the claimants have waited so long and so patiently, when compensation can at last be paid to them.
Our discussions in the House have been almost exclusively concerned with one broad question—whether disposing of the assets for the benefit of our claimants is legally and morally justified in the light of the unhappy history of the former Baltic States and of the situation obtaining in those territories today. I think, therefore, that the House will not wish me to traverse again today all the ground that I covered in moving the Second Reading of the Bill.
The problem dealt with by the Bill has a rather special history. The Baltic States were incorporated in the U.S.S.R., which we recognise as the de jacto Government of the three States, in August, 1940, but were under German occupation from 1941 to 1945. Before their incorporation, the Baltic States had in the summer of 1940 come under considerable Soviet pressure and ceased to a large extent to be free agents.
Some hon. Members, such as the hon. and gallant Member for Lewes (Sir T. Beamish) may say that they had ceased altogether to be free. I will not quibble about this. The fact remains, however, that during this twilight period the three States continued to have a separate international existence. Their Governments continued to be recognised de jure by Her Majesty's Government and we continued to have diplomatic relations with them.
It was during this period that far-reaching nationalisation measures were

put into force; all enterprises were taken over that employed more than 20 workers, or more than 10 workers if mechanical power were used in the concern. The United Kingdom Government of the day protested to the Baltic Governments against these measures.
The effect of these measures was twofold. Baltic companies owning assets in this country, mainly banks and other corporate bodies, were nationalised. At the same time, our foreign investment in the States—made up partly of holdings and interests in some of those same banks and companies—was lost. Other British property in the Baltic States was nationalised without compensation, including the homes and businesses of the members of the British community.
The laws then passed also purported to affect the Baltic external debt. Subsequently, the Baltic States were incorporated in the U.S.S.R. and the central banks were absorbed into the Soviet banking system.
In July, 1940, the Soviet State Bank attempted to secure possession of the gold held by the central banks in London. To safeguard British interests—and this was made clear at the time—the gold, together with other assets, was blocked by Her Majesty's Government in accordance with wartime powers. In retaliation against our action, the Soviet Government ceased to redeem the Lena and Tetiuhe Notes upon maturity.
When the Baltic States were overrun by the Germans in the following year, both the gold and other assets in this country came under the trading with the enemy legislation. The situation which confronted Her Majesty's Government at the end of the war, after the re-occupation of the area by the U.S.S.R. was this. The Soviet Government were claiming that, as a matter of municipal law in these areas, the Soviet-controlled enterprises had become the successors of the former Baltic concerns and the successors in title to the assets in this country.
The gold was claimed on the basis of purchase. The Soviet Government put forward claims against Her Majesty's Government to these assets. We, on the other hand, were claiming from the Soviet Government, as the sole, albeit


de facto, Government of the area, compensation in respect of the British interests that had been dispossessed. Many years of diplomatic correspondence followed. But it was only in 1959 that agreement was reached between the then British Administration and the Soviet Government for the holding of negotiations to cover the various claims and counter-claims.
The Agreement of 5th January, 1968, which has led to this Bill, was the outcome of these negotiations. Of course, the responsibility for the Agreement must rest on the present Administration.

Colonel Sir Tufton Beamish: When did the negotiations start?

Mr. Whitlock: Attempts to resolve this matter have been going on since 1940, and I understand that an attempt at negotiations in this connection began in 1959.
As I was saying, the responsibility for the Agreement which has been reached must rest on the present Administration, but essentially it was in 1959 that the basic decision was taken to negotiate with the Soviet Government, the de facto Government of the area, about the assets situated in this country.

Sir William Teeling: The hon. Gentleman has referred to 1959. He must be aware that, for many years before, we were frequently discussing with the Russian Government the possibility of dealing with the whole of the problem, which included the Czarist bonds and those with which we are here concerned. It was only in 1959 that suddenly the Russians said, "We will deal with these first".

Mr. Whitlock: The Bill is concerned with the Baltic assets. I would be out of order if I yielded to the blandishments of the hon. Member for Brighton, Pavilion (Sir W. Teeling) to consider the whole vexed problem of Czarist assets.
Title to these assets had formerly rested with interests in the Baltic States that had, as I have explained, in 1940 lost their identity and ceased to have a separate existence. The choice at that time was whether to proceed in this way, with the prospect of some sort of offsetting arrangement at the end of the road, or whether to leave the Baltic assets inviolate and, by the same token, to leave the British claimants unsatisfied,

for an indefinite period, in the hope that one day the Baltic States would again emerge with which both sides of the question could be discussed.
This was the choice and I do not see how any British Government who combined a respect for international law with a sense of realism could have decided other than did the Government of the time; to enter into negotiations with the U.S.S.R. rather than postpone action until some date in the remote, indefinite future.
Once we had begun negotiations on this problem on the terms agreed in 1959 between the British Government of the day and the Soviet Government, the logical outcome was a settlement of some kind. This was reached in February, 1967 and the Bill follows from it.
In spite of the fears of some hon. Gentlemen opposite, there is nothing dishonourable or illegal in the Bill. I repeat that the Government are satisfied that the Bill does not offend against international law. As to the moral aspect, it is now surely our duty to see that some satisfaction is given to those longstanding claims by British people. But before doing so we have made the best arrangement we could with the only Government of the territories concerned, under which that Government have undertaken not to pursue their claim to the assets.
Hon. Members need feel no compunction about sending the Bill to another place and will not, I hope, feel it necessary to divide the House. As I have tried to show, it would set the seal on a course of action which has been followed for a number of years, and I have no hesitation in commending it to them.

8.40 p.m.

Mr. Wood: My hon. Friends and I tabled the Motion to enable us to have a debate on Third Reading because we remain seriously disquieted by certain aspects of the Anglo-Soviet Agreement and the Bill which gives it effect. I agree with the Under-Secretary that there is no need to go over at this late stage all the ground which was covered on Second Reading and in Committee, but as the months pass the Agreement appears—at any rate, to me—to be more and more grotesque.
The hon. Gentleman can rightly claim that negotiations had continued over a


long period under previous Governments. But on Second Reading, he said this:
Negotiations began in earnest in 1965 in London and continued for two years."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 7th November, 1968; Vol, 772, c. 1097.]
I challenged the hon. Gentleman to produce any evidence to prove that a Conservative Government had in mind the kind of Agreement which was signed at the beginning of last year. There is no doubt that a just settlement of outstanding claims was and remains desirable in itself, but the whole House knows that this Agreement was reached for political reasons. There is not necessarily any harm in that, provided that it brought with it political gains, that it was a good bargain, and that it was a fair bargain.
One searches in vain now for the significant contribution which this understanding with Mr. Kosygin was expected to make towards the détente between East and West. There have been no political gains whatsoever. It is hard to see how the bargain can be described, from the British point of view, as either good or fair. Britain put forward claims of £15 million. The Soviet Union put forward claims of £10 million. To clinch the deal, we had to give the Russians a tip of £½ million. This grandiose generosity seems to be hideously discordant with the events which are going on in Czechoslovakia today.
We have also asked at other stages of the Bill whether it is justifiable for Her Majesty's Government to reach any agreement with the Soviet Union about the disposal of assets which belong neither to them nor to us, unless they are prepared to give an undertaking that they would both admit and meet a valid claim if the owners of those assets once again became free agents.
As the whole House is only too aware, I am not an international lawyer. I am generally wise enough to leave these complicated matters to my hon. and learned Friend the Member for Northwich (Sir J. Foster), who has an inimitable grasp of this subject: or to my hon. and gallant Friend the Member for Lewes (Sir T. Beamish), who has made such a close study of these claims and who has pursued the matter with such persistence; or to my hon. Friend the Member for Brighton, Pavilion, (Sir W. Teeling), who

I understand, may attempt to catch your eye later, Mr. Deputy Speaker.
If my hon. Friend does, I also understand that it will be one of the last speeches that he makes in the House. I assure him that we shall listen to him with immense interest, tinged with regret because we shall not have an opportunity to hear him here in future.
What I find difficult to understand is the Government's reluctance so far during the passage of the Bill to admit that the Agreement which is enshrined in the Bill cannot possibly contradict what I understand to be the requirements of international law, namely, that the submission of a valid claim at a future date could not validly be refused. My hon. Friends and I are not opposed to any agreement. As the Under-Secretary pointed out, a Conservative Government strove to secure one. But we do say with strong feeling that the Agreement to which the Bill gives effect was a bad one—a bad bargain for this country; one which was reached mainly for the sake of political advantage, which it has emphatically not secured; and one that is unfair to the Baltic States, whose only shortcoming has been that they were invaded by the Soviet Union, then overrun by Nazi Germany, then liberated by Russia, and that they remain so liberated today.
The Under-Secretary has told my hon. and gallant Friend the Member for Lewes in a letter that
any future Government in the Baltic States would clearly not be precluded from making representations … for the return of the assets.
I believe that in the circumstances it is essential that he goes a great deal further and admits that the obligations of international law, that any future Government of this country is bound to meet any valid claim from a future Government in the Baltic States, are in no way incompatible with the agreement that has been reached, or with this Bill.
The Government have seemed unwilling to make this admission. The Agreement that they have reached appears to me and to a number of my hon. Friends in a worse and worse light as the months go by, and it is for these reasons that I ask my hon. Friends to join me in registering disapproval by voting against the Third Reading of the Bill.

8.46 p.m.

Colonel Sir Tufton Beamish: First, may I take the opportunity of thanking the Under-Secretary of State for the very considerable trouble he has taken to answer a large number of questions that I have put to him, mostly in writing, since the Second Reading. Although he has not been able to resolve my serious misgivings about the Bill, he has shown great patience and forbearance, and I am most grateful to him.
Few if any Measures are passed without doubts and criticisms remaining in some quarters. However when we reach the Third Reading we can usually comfort ourselves with the knowledge that certain improvements have been made and a few points conceded or, at worst, careful scrutiny and vigorous debate have revealed some merit or justification that was not immediately clear to us at first sight.
I do not think that is so in the case of this Bill. The Foreign Compensation Bill has come through its stages unscathed. It has by no means improved on acquaintance. It remains, in words which have already been applied to it today, a shabby Measure. I think it is a furtive one, a hole-in-the-corner Bill, and unworthy of the Statute Book. My objections remain as strong as before. I snail refer to them briefly, as I have taken earlier opportunities to explain them in detail.
My objections are threefold. First, the Bill is yet another example of the way in which the present Government treat Parliament as a rubber stamp and flout proper democratic procedures. Secondly, I think the Bill places expediency above the law. Thirdly, it cheats the people of the Baltic States, including exiles in this country and abroad, of their title to their property. At the same time, it damages our reputation for fair dealing in the eyes of the world.
I propose to explain those objections briefly. First, how does the Bill flout the authority of Parliament? It does so in three ways, all of them serious. Discussions have continued off and on between the Soviet Union and the United Kingdom about the Baltic gold assets for almost 30 years, as the Under-Secretary told us—discussion, not negotiation. The Under-Secretary's reply to me that negotiations virtually started in 1959 was not

completely accurate. Serious negotiations, as my right hon. Friend the Member for Bridlington (Mr. Wood) said, started in 1965, not in 1959 when the Order in Council was passed. The full responsibility for this Measure, as the Under-Secretary accepted, rests entirely with Her Majesty's Government and not in any way with the Opposition.
During recent negotiations I have constantly sought and been given firm assurance that no agreement would take effect without Parliamentary approval. For instance, I was clearly told in writing by the Minister of State, Foreign Office, that the realisation of the Baltic assets was subject to Parliamentary authority. That was in his letter to me of 15th June, 1967, yet exactly two weeks later, without Parliament so much as being informed, let alone consulted, the gold was sold. I elicited this information through two Parliamentary Questions. On 28th November, 1967, I was told:
The gold was sold earlier this year and the proceeds invested ".—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 28th November, 1967; Vol. 755, c. 67.]
On 6th December, 1967, I learned, also in reply to a Question, that the gold was sold on 29th June, 1967, two weeks after I had been given an assurance that it would not be sold without Parliamentary authority. That is scandalous. During two weeks in June, 1967 the Government changed their mind and broke their promise without informing Parliament.
Before the Anglo-Soviet Agreement of 5th January, 1968, was signed, the then Under-Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs told the House:
It is the case that legislation would be required before the process of distribution took place."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 23rd October, 1967; Vol. 751, c. 1351.]
I hope that the Minister is taking note of those exact words. I assure him that there is no special pleading in my speech.
It is true that in Clause 1(5) the Custodian of Enemy Property is given powers to repay into the Consolidated Fund, out of the Baltic assets, the sum of £500,000 already distributed to the Soviet Union. At first sight, this might appear to be the fulfilment of the undertaking given by the Under-Secretary. No doubt the Government argue, in their devious way, that the payment to the Soviet Union was not a direct distribution of the Baltic assets. But this transaction


was included in page 33 of the Supplementary Civil Estimates for 1967–68, which were not published until 15th February last year, a whole month after the £500,000 was deposited in the Bank of England to the credit of the Soviet Union. That is equally scandalous. So both the letter and the spirit of the promise given by the Government have been totally ignored.
My third example of the short-circuiting of Parliament is that shortly after the Anglo-Soviet Agreement was signed I asked the then Foreign Secretary why the £500,000 promised to the Soviet Union had been handed over without Parliament being consulted. He replied:
The Agreement will be subject in due course to Parliamentary approval. If Parliament turns it down, that will be that.'"—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 23rd January, 1968; Vol. 757, c. 210.]
But that will be what? What happens if Parliament rejects the Bill now? Not only has the £500,000 been handed over to the Soviet Union, but now we have been told that it has been spent. What happens to the waiving of the debts on both sides if the Bill is defeated?
The fact is that the Agreement was ratified by the United Kingdom when the Prime Minister signed it. He fell for what I can only describe as a confidence trick and paid over to the Soviet Union £500,000 which did not belong to him or this country. This shady deal is put before Parliament as a fait accompli, a procedure which could conceivably be justified only by extreme urgency, and even then I doubt whether it could really be justified. But there was not the least urgency in this case. My hon. and learned Friend the Member for Northwich (Sir J. Foster) was right when he said earlier that there was no need for an Agreement at all, and there certainly was no urgency. The Agreement was part of a package deal, the main purpose of which was to set the wheels in motion for a Treaty of Friendship with the Soviet Union.
This Bill is only a rotten little bundle in the package—incidentally the only item in the package that has not dissolved into thin air. There is no sign whatever of the Treaty of Friendship that was to be Britain's reward. Very much the reverse, as my right hon. Friend the Member for Bridlington (Mr. Wood) said

in his excellent speech. This Agreement is hideously discordant with the terrible events today in Czechoslovakia, the death of Jan Palach, and other students trying to burn themselves to death. So much for the three positive ways in which the Bill represents the deliberate short-circuiting of Parliament, directly contrary to Government promises. I hope that when the Under-Secretary comes to reply there will be some explanation of why this has been done, although I very much doubt it.
My second major criticism is that this Measure places expediency above the law. The Under-Secretary summed it up when he tried to justify the Bill on Second Reading. He said:
The Agreement with the Soviet Union and the measures to give effect to it which are now submitted to the House are to be judged by the criterion of what is practicable rather than by ideal standards of justice."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 7th November, 1968; Vol. 772, c. 1106.]
This was the start of the Under-Secretary's peroration, read from a carefully prepared brief. The Under-Secretary has tried to wriggle out of this by saying that the context clearly shows that he referred only to the effect of the Agreement for British claimants.
During the earlier stages of the Bill some of us accepted that. I have looked again at his words, and it is perfectly clear to me that the context of this is straightforward. I still find it difficult to put any interpretation on his words other than that he believed the Agreement and this Bill to be practicable rather than just. I believe that to be the case. It is practicable, although it is a pretty rotten Bill, and it is certainly not just. Whether it was practicable in the sense of making the best of a bad job, I very much doubt.
All laws leave an unhappy aftermath of legal and political problems. There are inevitably disputes about the ownership of property, the validity of treaties and such things as the recognition of new territorial boundaries. The illegal and forcible annexation of Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania by the Soviet Union places Britain in all these quandaries. That is no justification at all for disregarding accepted principles of international law and using Baltic assets in settlement of Soviet debts to British subjects which the Soviet Union refuses to


meet. Imagine the outcry in Parliament had this Bill been presented in 1940, immediately after the Soviet occupation, or shall I say in 1941, during the Nazi occupation.
Imagine the outcome. The legal or illegal position has not changed since then. It is exactly the same, yet now we are asked to agree that the passage of years makes what was a grave affront to three friendly countries, brutally thrashed by bullying neighbours both respectable and acceptable—merely the passage of years! It is neither respectable nor acceptable to me. We have given the Government repeated opportunities to make it clear to the Baltic States and the world that Britain would be ready to make full restitution of Baltic assets when these countries regain their independence, as we all hope they will.
We have asked for verbal assurances, we have suggested that a restitution Clause might be written into the Bill. In refusing to do either of these things it seems that the Government have tried to justify their policy by the hollow pretence, of which we heard echoes again today, that when certain events injurious to Britain took place in the Baltic States in 1940 the Baltic Governments were in some way responsible for those events. We are asked to believe that they were not really under Soviet duress, that they were to some extent responsible for their own actions.
The fact of the matter, as we argued at length in Committee—and what we said then was not denied—is that these countries were not free agents, after the Soviet Union had crossed their frontiers, in any sense of the word, and in his heart the Under-Secretary of State knows that that is true. They were puppet Governments under direct Soviet orders.
For the purpose of the Bill, three small friendly nations, at present robbed of their freedom—for which they continue to pray—are treated as enemy countries. By Clause 1(2) their property may come under an Order such as might be made:
.. in relation to enemy property if a state of war existed.
When I raised this point in correspondence with the Under-Secretary of State, he explained again that the Baltic States became technically enemy territory

by reason of the German occupation in 1941. Of course they did—we all know that. This we fully understand and accept. But he went on to say, in his letter to me dated 6th January:
The reason why successive Administrations in this country have declined to make an Order terminating the status of the Baltic States as 'enemy territory' has been the need—in the absence of a Money and Property Agreement (such as was concluded with other States after the war)—to ensure as far as possible that Soviet interests were not in a position to procure the return of the assets to the Soviet Union.
If the Agreement had provided for a simple transfer of assets to the Soviet Union in return for an assurance that it would spend £500,000 on itself and use the rest in part payment of its debts to British subjects, it would have come to exactly the same thing as we are benig asked to ratify.
Far from protecting the Baltic assets from the clutch of the Soviet Union, all we are doing is acting as bankers for the Soviet Union, settling its debts on its behalf at its request. That is all it amounts to. Had the Government not given the firmest and clearest possible assurance that the Agreement with the Soviet Union and this Bill should not be regarded in any way as a step towards de jure, recognition of the Soviet occupation of the Baltic States, Baltic peoples in their own countries and in exile would have had cause to feel the gravest anxiety and mistrust.
My feelings, when I come to vote against the Bill, must be those of anger and shame. This is a thoroughly bad Bill. It is highly questionable on a number of legal grounds. It is morally indefensible. It is a bad Bill brought in by an unprincipled and weak Government, and I will be no party to it.

9.4 p.m.

Mr. Douglas Dodds-Parker: I shall not take up much time, following the excellent speeches of my right hon. Friend the Member for Bridlington (Mr. Wood) and of my hon. and gallant Friend the Member for Lewes (Sir T. Beamish). Like a number of hon. Members on both sides, I have been involved personally since 1939 in the affairs of these countries and with a number of the individuals concerned in their governments and their own ordinary


affairs. If we pass the Bill without any gesture, as though this were just a tidying-up operation, it will be much misunderstood in areas where these actions are still studied, despite the curtain which seeks to divide us from our friends in Eastern Europe.
This is a tidying-up operation with which, as such, I have considerable sympathy. When I was sitting in the hot seat now occupied by the Under-Secretary of State, it used to be put to me by my hon. Friend the Member for Brighton, Pavilion (Sir W. Teeling) that we should take action on this matter. I therefore have no objection in principle to tidying up these Baltic balances, as I used to know them. There are, however, two provisos which should be taken into account.
The first is that the present is a thoroughly bad moment to do this. Who is to say that none of the countries mentioned in the Preamble to the Bill will ever be free again and will never be able to claim some of the assets which are to be distributed on their behalf? As was pointed out in Committee, things have happened in Eastern Europe during the past 200 years. Countries have gone under the surface and have emerged again. I for one would certainly not say that any of these countries will not one day be in the position to claim again these assets which the Government are proposing to distribute in the way set out in the Bill.
As my hon. and gallant Friend the Member for Lewes, who has taken such a long-term interest in these affairs, has pointed out, there could not be a worse moment than the present. Whatever may have been the circumstances when the Prime Minister took the lead in reaching an agreement with Mr. Kosygin two years ago, the events of August, 1968, should surely have led the Government to delay a bit further, at least until we saw what was coming out from Central Europe. It will, I believe, be very much misunderstood there that we should choose this time and method of distributing the Baltic balances.
My second point, on which I got no reply from the Under-Secretary in Committee, concerns the £½ million. No explanation was given, although possibly I can guess the reason. Fairly rough

things were said in Committee about the intervention in this matter of the Prime Minister, who appears to have tossed away £½ million of other people's money. I suppose that he did not mind doing it with other people's money—a typical Socialist gesture. He tossed it away for no apparent reason. I ask the Under-Secretary once again to explain how it comes about that the Prime Minister appears lightly to have tossed in, as a bribe—to use a simple word—this sum of money, which is not even British money, but is other people's money, to the Russians, to come to an agreement with them.
For these two reasons I hope that, when the Under-Secretary replies, he will explain why the Government press on at this moment and why the £½ million is being given away.

9.8 p.m.

Mr. Maxwell-Hyslop: I share the indignation which has been voiced at this shoddy Bill. The countries in question may temporarily be overrun by Russia. This has happened before in history. Poland has disappeared as a nation at various times in history and has re-emerged; and Lithuania was once one of the great military Powers of Europe.
Are we to assume that these States have ceased to exist for all time merely because the Government want to do, by the authority of Parliament, something which, if it were done by any citizen, he would be sent to prison for fraudulent conversion? If any citizen of this country, with money entrusted to him by a third party for a specific purpose—namely, to be safeguarded for him—did, without the owner's consent, what the Government are asking authority for themselves to do, he would be convicted of fraudulent conversion, embezzlement, or perhaps both.
One does not have to go far outside this country to learn of the contempt in which it is held because of the shoddy dealings of its Government. Here is another of them. Because these three little countries, each of whose independence is guaranteed by numerous treaties signed with the Soviet Union, are now at this time powerless to defend their own property, Great Britain—well, Britain, under this Administration—proceeds to hand out their assets which


were deposited in this country purely and solely for one reason, to safeguard them, in case those countries were overrun by Russia or Germany. That eventuality happened. What now is done? The successors of the Administration which accepted that money in good faith are now handing it away to a third party in bad faith, and are asking Parliament to connive at this dishonourable act.
It is a shameful thing. I suppose that because the Government are getting so used to doing shameful things it no longer afflicts the consciences of hon. and right hon. Gentlemen and hon. Ladies opposite; it no longer afflicts their consciences in the least. It is not less a shameful thing because of that.
Is it even a prudent thing to do? There are other people who entrust their money to the Bank of England. The Sheikh of Kuwait, potentates in the Persian Gulf, entrust their money to the Bank of England and entrust their gold to the Bank of England. What lesson are they to learn from the dishonourable way in which the Government hand out assets without the consent and against the wishes of the owners—hand out to third parties assets entrusted to them?
What lessons are other parties to learn? How can anyone else believe that his assets are safe in the keeping of the Bank of England, or can be entrusted to any organs under the control of a British Government who conduct themselves in this way? How can it be prudent to hand it to those who break a trust in this way?
How can it be prudent to do it when there are other people overseas who entrust their money to us? It could lead to a further devaluation. This we know. It is transparently obvious. We depend on holding the confidence of a large number of people overseas. I warn the Under-Secretary. There is no one senior to him in the Government who takes the trouble to be present in the House tonight while this shoddy deed is done. I warn the hon. Gentleman that the consequences of this fraudulent action will be with us for many a day, and are likely to last for longer than ten times the remaining life of this Government.
The Bill runs to only three pages. One might think that it would not be very

hard, in a Bill which runs to only three pages, plus some definitions, to produce a long title which would state what is in the Bill. It does not even do that. The long title says:
A Bill to make provision with respect to certain property (including the proceeds thereof and any income or other property accruing therefrom) of persons "—
if the Under-Secretary will listen to this—
formerly resident or carrying on business in Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania …
"property. … of persons formerly resident or carrying on business …." What does that conceal?
It conceals that the Government propose, as they later say, to authorise the disposal of the property of a Baltic State; not property of persons, not property of those carrying on business, but the property of the State. If they wanted to do that, why did they not include it in the long title of the Bill?
Was it because they were so ashamed of what they were doing that they hoped that those who read the long title of the Bill would not realise that they intended to dispose of the assets entrusted by those three Governments to the British Government and the Bank of England? Was it because they still preserve—how they can have the gall to do so I know not—diplomatic relations with the Governments of those three Baltic States? Was it because those three Baltic States still have diplomatic missions, recognised as such, in London? Was that why they did not dare to put in the long title an indication of the shameful breach of trust which later on in the Bill they intended to authorise?
Let us have an answer from the Under-Secretary. The hon. Gentleman, of course, was not the originator of the Bill. We all know who was the originator; not the Under-Secretary, but the Prime Minister, because he wanted to feel nice and warm when Mr. Kosygin visited this country. He wanted to give something away in order to produce a smile on Mr. Kosygin's face. What better, thought the Prime Minister, to give away than the property of somebody else who has not authorised it and who is powerless to stop him. What a miserable fraud. This is what has been done and I say again, loud and clear, that we will have no part in it and will oppose it.

9.18 p.m.

Sir J. Foster: The occupation of these three countries by the Soviets is not recognised by this country, the nationalisation of the central banks is not recognised and the Government of the Soviet Republic are not recognised as the de jure Government of any of these three Republics. None of the assets which are to be distributed are in Soviet territory. So that if the Government wish to distribute the assets held in this country to the British claimants, there is nothing to stop them. They do not have to pay the Soviet Government £500,000.
How does the Under-Secretary justify the payment of £500,000? He says that it is to avoid any possible international claims. If the occupation is not recognised, if nationalisation is not recognised and the Government are not recognised, there is no possibility of an international claim. The Under-Secretary may answer me by saying that it was envisaged by preceding Conservative Governments that there would be an agreement with the Soviet Government. If that was envisaged, they were wrong. If they envisage making an agreement about Czarist assets in this country they will be equally wrong. There is no point in a burglar agreeing that he will not bring a claim against the person whose house he burgled and that therefore property missed by the burglar can be distributed.
There was then an attempt to say that, if we pleased the Soviets by this bribe or tip of £500,000, they might be disposed to enter into a friendship agreement with this country. But that is not worth anything. Certainly, it is not worth £500,000.
I was disappointed to hear the right hon. Gentleman trying to say that there were only two alternatives, the first being an agreement with the Soviet Government and the other sitting on the gold and not distributing it to the claimants. But there is another alternative in the shape of either an agreement with the Soviet Government or a distribution to the claimants. It was quite wrong of the hon. Gentleman to lead us to believe that that was the only alternative. If he looks at the Third Reading speech, he will see that he said that that was the only alternative. It is not, and anyone would think this Government very mis-

led to dip into the assets under their control which the Soviet Government cannot get and which the Soviet Government can make no claim upon, take £500,000 out of it and hand it over in order to get an agreement which is worthless, which has no effect and which gives nothing to this country and which says that the Soviet Government give up all claims on this country, when there are no claims which could be enforced. One could give money to a lot of people in return for their saying that they will not make claims on us. If they have no claims, it is easy for them to pocket the money and say that they will not make any.
If the hon. Gentleman is right and an agreement was envisaged, it means that successive British Governments have been wrong in assuming that it is necessary to come to an agreement with a Government who are not recognised as the Government of these countries and whose actions were not recognised. It means that we have arrived at the unwise position where Her Majesty's Government have to give up £500,000 in order to get a worthless agreement.
I hope that the hon. Gentleman will deal with this point. It was made both in Committee and on Second Reading, and it cannot be right for him to set out two alternatives when there is another obvious one. What makes it worse is that the £500,000 was already paid out to the Russian Government before the House of Commons could step in and say, if it felt so minded, that it approved of the agreement and would like a safeguard in it, or that it approved of it without a safeguard. In the event, the House was deprived of the opportunity of saying that it did not approve of giving the Russians any money and that it wanted no part of any agreement but, instead, that the money should be distributed to British claimants who have been out of their money for 30 years.
That was an obvious alternative, and I ask the House to vote against the Bill on the ground that the Government need not have paid £500,000 to the Russian Government.

Several Hon. Members: Several Hon. Members rose—

Mr. Speaker: Before I call the next speaker, I am sure that the hon. Gentleman concerned will not mind my informing hon. Members that he is about to


make what he told me earlier today would be his swansong on a matter to which he has devoted himself. Sir William Teeling.

9.24 p.m.

Sir W. Teeling: Mr. Speaker, I am put in a very embarrassing position, because I am not leaving the House for the next few weeks, and it is always possible that God may give me some ideas and that you, Mr. Speaker, may let me catch your eye again.
A little more embarrassing has been the charming way in which my right hon. Friend the Member for Bridlington (Mr. Wood) made some very kind remarks about me, because I find myself disagreeing with him about the Bill. However, he knew about that before he said what he did.
It is again very embarrassing, having been 25 years in the House of Commons, spending most of that time fighting a Labour Government, if I could, and the rest of the time often fighting a Conservative Government if I disagreed with what they were doing, to find that tonight I am not entirely out of sympathy with what the Labour Government are doing, and I am not willing to fight very hard, even beside my great friend from my neighbouring constituency, the hon. and gallant Member for Lewes (Sir T. Beamish), who has put forward some strong and good arguments. So, also, has my hon. Friend the Member for Cheltenham (Mr. Dodds-Parker). During those years since the war, when we were discussing the Baltic bonds problems, many times I have been to see him at the Foreign Office leading delegations to discuss this problem. But in those earlier days it was not called the question of the Baltic bonds; we were supposed to be claiming to be paid for all that was owed to us by the Soviet Government going back to Czarist days.
Then, suddenly—perhaps not even suddenly—we got different invitations to go to Moscow, and, one after the other, Under-Secretaries called us quickly into the Foreign Office—indeed, one was no less a person than the present Leader of the Opposition—to discuss what Russia might put forward and what we should claim for debts we thought we were owed. They included not only the Baltic bonds in those days, but the Lena goldfields and

matters like that, which have already been mentioned.
Up to just before 1959, the supposed date of this opening discussion with Russia about the Baltic bonds, we had to discuss everything together. Then suddenly Russia said, "We will now discuss the Baltic bonds and leave the others behind." Many of us were very worried, but we were assured at that time that there was no doubt that the other problems, such as the Czarist bonds, would be discussed the moment that these Baltic bonds were cleared.
I am sure that I should be out of order if I discussed the Czarist bonds. Therefore, I suggest that some Members of Parliament, when they have a little spare time occasionally, should read Volume 701 of the OFFICIAL REPORT, 1964–65. It is not all that far back. It will be seen that the whole matter was discussed. Not only the Baltic bonds and the Czarist bonds, but many others—Hungarian, Rumanian, and so on—they were discussed not only by myself, but by the gentleman who knew a lot about Russia, from what we have heard recently, Commander Courtney. He also spoke about Russian bonds. The right hon. Member for Dundee, East (Mr. George Thomson) replied. I think that he probably even knew more than the hon. Gentleman opposite on this subject. He was fighting battles very hard for all these different causes.
I hope and believe that before we close tonight the hon. Gentleman will assure us that once this Baltic question is settled the Government's promise will be maintained and they will go on to deal with the next problems, namely, the Czarist debts. In the meantime, I should like to point out why I do not agree with my hon. Friends so much tonight. Many people over these years have contacted me, and committees connected with me, on this subject and have pointed out how much they have lost, how unhappy they are and how poor many of them are. There is a great deal of money which should go to very poor people connected with this problem.
To my mind, we are arguing just a bit too much in the air on the question whether we should hand over £500,000 to the Russians and, at the same time, whether we should be dealing with this


matter in not a detailed way, but in such an airy-fairy way. We should realise that there are practical questions to be dealt with, and that there are people who badly need this money. The practical reasons are the only ones that should be considered.
There is no question that when Mr. Kosygin came to London nothing much was agreed with him, but this matter was very quickly settled—within two days. Russia does not look upon Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania as separate nations that will one day regain their independence. They may. But they did not always have independence. Well before the First World War they were all part of Russia, as was Finland. Finland broke away. In my earlier days here we have had two hon. Members who came from Finland—Mr. Zilliacus and Sir Patrick Donner. They were both Finns, and were Members of our Parliament.
Both Finland and the Baltic States originally belonged to Russia. According to Russia the Baltic States still belong to her. That is why she has always wanted to put these problems together and keep them together. We must try to put ourselves into the minds of the Russians if we are to have discussions and arrive at agreements with them. We have to think of the financial questions of trade with Russia and friendship with Russia. We should not forget that when Lord Thomson went to Russia he asked Mr. Khrushchev whether he would make financial agreements with us, but Mr. Khrushchev said, "We cannot, as long as you have these Baltic and Czarist points to be dealt with". It was made quite clear that Russia seriously thinks of these problems together.
I am not sure that much of what has been said here tonight will help us in our future relations with Russia. I am not particularly anxious to be friendly with Russia; I never have been. But as I am leaving this House I should like to put forward the view that we must try, sometimes, to be a little more practical, and to realise what many parts of the world, including many Estonians, Latvians and Lithuanians living in this country realise—that these people and Britons, too, want their money to be distributed now.

9.32 p.m.

Mr. Gordon Campbell: I shall be brief because the case has been well put by my right hon. and hon. Friends and I explained my general views on the Bill in the Second Reading debate on 7th November.
The Minister has gone through the history again. The main facts are that the United Kingdom has not recognised de jure the Soviet annexation of the three Baltic States; nor has she recognised that the Baltic gold that was held in this country belongs to the Soviet Union. Furthermore, the fact that the gold at one time came into the possession of the Custodian of Enemy Property is an accident of history.
Having, after nearly 30 years, decided to dispose of the gold, the Government need not have arranged for this to be part of a one-sided agreement with the Soviet Union. The assets could have been disposed of and distributed to the British claimants without these complications, provided that there was at the same time a clear understanding that the legal rights of the owners of the gold were protected. The gold had been held in trust by the Bank of England for the central banks of Latvia, Estonia and Lithuania, and my objection is that no assurance has been given while the Bill has been going through the House that the legal interests of the owners of the gold are protected. This throws doubt upon the expression, "Safe as the Bank of England." It has the effect of tarnishing Britain's reputation at a time when it is in need of some burnishing.
As regards the Custodian of Enemy Property, I recollect that, before the Italian peace treaty came into effect in September, 1947, much Italian property was held by the Custodian, but I do not know of any Italian bodies or individuals who have been penalised in this way as a result.
The Government's argument against making a general statement of the kind which I and my right hon. Friend have asked for has been that they cannot cater for a hypothetical situation and that they cannot commit a future Government. I believe that a general statement would not run into these difficulties. I recognise that there is at least one problem. This arises from the possibility of the Soviet


Union at a future date deciding, for no doubt other reasons, to set up puppet Governments in puppet independent Baltic States. If that happened, I could see that those Governments might then claim a spurious independence and try to claim the gold, but this is a situation which I am sure everyone in the House would recognise as being quite artificial and which need not be within the terms of a statement of the kind which I think that the Government should make. We would not regard such puppet Governments or States as genuine successors of the original owners.
Therefore, I still ask the Government to make a general statement that the genuine owners' or legal successors' interests will be protected and that such owners or successors, in States which we regarded as independent, could make, not a claim against the gold itself, which, of course, would no longer be there because it has been disposed of, but a claim which could be recognised for the value which the gold would then have attained. Surely they could find a way of making such a statement. Besides manifestly doing justice to the situation, this could lend hear: to peoples in many States, including Czechoslovakia, who have to put up with present conditions and who must live on hope for the future.

9.38 p.m.

Mr. Whitlock: It is the custom—

Mr. Speaker: Order. The hon. Member needs leave of the House to speak again.

Mr. Whitlock: With your permission, Mr. Speaker, and by leave of the House, I should like to speak again.
It is the custom of the House to congratulate an hon. Member who has made a maiden speech. I have never had that pleasure, but on this occasion I hope I shall be forgiven for congratulating the hon. Member for Brighton, Pavilion (Sir W. Teeling) on what you, Mr. Speaker, have described as his "swansong". Many of us in the House best get to know our colleagues not within the confines of this building but on delegations to other countries. It was on a Commonwealth Parliamentary delegation that I first got to know the hon. Member, and from that time on I have held him in

very high regard and affection. That regard has been heightened tonight, because he is the only hon. Member to have spoken who has supported me.
You, Mr. Speaker, as with hon. Members who make maiden speeches, have allowed the hon. Member a great deal of licence. You allowed him to talk about the Czarist assets—

Mr. Speaker: Order. I would not allow the Minister the same licence.

Mr. Whitlock: That is exactly what I anticipated, Mr. Speaker.
The hon. Member for Brighton, Pavilion has given us some homework to do. When he is looking back on the speeches which he and others have made on this subject, I hope that one day he will be able to see what has been going on in Parliament and agree that we, too, have done our homework in this matter.
I will not go once again over all the points which have been raised on Second Reading and in Committee about the agreement which was reached, the need for an agreement—which the hon. and learned Member for Northwich (Sir J. Foster) disputes—and the need to have what was called the tip when £500,000 was allegedly tossed away. If hon. Members read the OFFICIAL REPORT of our Committee proceedings in columns 45 to 48, they will see that all these matters were dealt with.
When hon. Members talk about the respective British and Russian claims, they should accept that the figure of £15 million for British claims represents simply the sum of the value put on those claims by the individual claimants themselves. To be frank—I pointed this out on Second Reading—some of those claims would perhaps not stand impartial scrutiny or might be described as, naturally, somewhat inflated.
The Soviet side did not recognise the existence of liabilities up to £15 million and accepted liabilities of less than £3 million. The Soviet claim, amounting to £10 million, does not mean that there are assets of that amount in the control of Her Majesty's Government and available for distribution to claimants here.
As I pointed out, if independent Governments were in a position to make claims in those three States, they would


also be in a position to accept obligations. We would then be able to respond by restating our claims which, if these figures are correct, would be bigger than theirs. When Her Majesty's Government blocked the Baltic assets, it was made clear that the action was being taken to protect British interests which were under attack by nationalisation measures and that we fully reserved all our rights in respect of the assets which were within our jurisdiction.
One of the basic assumptions of the 1959 decision to try again by the then Administration and to come to an understanding with the U.S.S.R. was that the assets under the control of the Crown and within the jurisdiction of the United Kingdom would inevitably be part of the settlement. I understand that it is the view of the right hon. Member for Bridlington (Mr. Wood) and some of his hon. Friends that it was right to negotiate with the Soviet Union. He said on Second Reading:
I do not deny the case for agreement in the circumstances which have arisen over the years and in the situation which now obtains in Eastern Europe"—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 7th November, 1968; Vol. 772, c. 1110–11.]
I am not sure whether the hon. and gallant Member for Lewes (Sir T. Beamish) shares his view. Certainly the hon. Member for Tiverton (Mr. Maxwell-Hyslop), in some intemperate language, managed to make it clear that he did not approve of our coming to an agreement with the Russians.

Mr. Maxwell-Hyslop: I did not say anything about the tightness or wrong-ness of our coming to an agreement with the Russians. I devoted almost the whole of my speech to the ethics of giving away something entrusted to us by one party to another party without the consent of the first party. I did not allude to the ethics of reaching an agreement of any sort with the Russians.

Mr. Whitlock: I am glad to have the position made clear.
We appreciate and respect the zeal and tenacity with which the hon. and gallant Member for Lewes defends in this House the interests of the peoples of the former Baltic States. Perhaps he will tell us whether, in his opinion, the right course for the Government to have

taken in 1959 would have been to leave everything, both the Baltic assets and the British claims, indefinitely frozen.
We should bear in mind that the peoples of Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania—for whom we feel the greatest sympathy in their powerlessness to affect the course of events that has overtaken them since 1940—would not be one jot or tittle better off for such a decision and will, by the same token, in no way suffer from the action which this Bill is designed to authorise.
Against this background, I should like to look a little more closely at the suspicions which have been expressed over the present Measure which brings to a conclusion the line of action initiated nearly 10 years ago. It has been said that what we are proposing to do is something in some way illegal and immoral and that in some sense Britain is the trustee of the former Baltic States and is acting in breach of trust. It has been said that we are taking the gold from them when they have lost their freedom and are disabled. It is suggested that even though we may have been right to negotiate with the Soviet Government and to conclude an agreement we should make some sort of guarantee of eventual restitution to the Baltic States if their freedom was to be regained.
If hon. Members look at the OFFICIAL REPORT of the proceedings in Committee they will see that I said:
nothing contained in or done under the Bill would preclude any independent Baltic republic at some time in the future from submitting a claim to the British Government of the day in respect of the property in question if it considered that it had such a claim."—[OFFICIAL REPORT,Standing Committee A, 19th November, 1968, c. 23.]
The approach of the hon. and gallant Member for Lewes in particular has been very eloquent and moved in emotive language but it does not, I fear, pay much attention to the realities of the situation. Whether we like it or not, the three independent Baltic States have as such disappeared. The fact that we have recognised the Soviet Government as the de facto but not de jure Government of the region which formerly comprised the Baltic States does not mean that there exist any competing de jure Governments at the present time.
Our treaties with the independent Baltic States ceased to be operative when the Baltic States were incorporated into the Soviet Union because from that time there have been no independent Governments with whom the treaties could operate. Similarly neither the central banks nor the corporate bodies to whom in the main the assets formerly belonged any longer exist. They cannot be the rightful owners of the assets if they do not exist. The gold, as hon. Members know, was a good many years ago the subject of a vesting order made under the trading with the enemy legislation vesting the legal title to it in the Custodian of Enemy Property with power to sell—a power which has been exercised.
All that the Bill before us today aims to do is to enable the Custodian to hand over these assets and the proceeds of the sale of the gold to the Foreign Compensation Commission for distribution to the claimants.

Mr. John Biggs-Davison: The hon. Gentleman is discussing the distribution of these assets which had been realised. Will he explain before he reaches the end of his speech why the assets including the gold were realised and distributed without Parliamentary approval despite the written undertaking given to my hon. and gallant Friend the Member for Lewes (Sir T. Beamish) by the Under-Secretary's right hon. Friend in a letter which I hold in my hand? Is it not a case that the gold was sold in June, 1967, without Parliamentary approval? Is this not most damaging? Will the Under-Secretary be sure to deal with this point?

Mr. Whitlock: The hon. Member says that he was given an assurance that the gold would not be sold without Parliamentary approval. He must be mistaken. I know of no such assurance and I would gladly investigate the complaint—[Interruption.] I am not going to listen to some sentences in a letter taken entirely out of context. The gold was sold under the power vested in the Custodian of Enemy Property. Contrary to what the hon. Member for Chigwell (Mr. Biggs-Davison) says, there has been no distribution of the assets.
These British claimants were deprived of their rights either by the action of the

Baltic States at the time when they were still in diplomatic relations with us or by measures taken by the Soviet Government. These claimants remain uncompensated. In all these circumstances we have no doubt of our legal or of our moral entitlement to take and dispose of the Baltic assets for the purpose of this Bill.
It is no more than the last step in a process which began many years ago. The Agreement which we made with the Soviet Government preserves the principle that we do not recognise Soviet title to any part of the assets; and it remains our position that the incorporation of the Baltic States into the U.S.S.R. has not been recognised de jure by Her Majesty's Government.
As a last resort, it has been urged by the Opposition that the British Government ought to give some guarantee of eventual restitution to the Baltic States. It is, I think, on this point alone that I and the right hon. Member for Bridlington part company. He appreciates that to do so would be to bind a future British Government. But we can none of us foresee the circumstances in which we might be called upon to honour such a guarantee.
We do not know when, whether, or what sort of independent nations will emerge in the Baltic States and be accorded recognition by Her Majesty's Government. Hon. Members are familiar with the criteria by which we are normally guided in deciding to accord recognition. These criteria turn primarily on the question whether as a matter of fact a Government can be said to have established effective control.
But it does not follow that such States, even though recognised, would automatically step into the shoes of their immediate or more remote predecessors in regard to these assets. They might not be regarded as the successors or the reversioners of the pre-war Republican Governments that no longer exist, or take shape within the same boundaries. They might be regarded as completely new Governments, succeeding within their new borders to the present Soviet Government.
We do not know what sort of attitude such independent Governments might adopt towards the period between 1940


and the date of their independence. They might be States under Soviet influence or, at any rate, regarded by the Soviets as within what they are now calling the "Socialist Commonwealth". Certainly, it would be quite wrong for me today to make a commitment which would bind Her Majesty's Government at that time in what are wholly hypothetical and unforeseeable circumstances.
Hon. Members opposite have made some play with the fact that many treaties to which Her Majesty's Government have become party inevitably relate to future circumstances, the shape of which cannot be fully foreseen at the time of signing or acceding to them. This I accept. But the giving of a binding undertaking in present circumstances would encompass hypothetical circumstances of quite a different order from any that might apply in an international agreement with an existing Government.
An international agreement is concluded with a Government whose status and position on an issue are known to us; but an undertaking for the restitution of the Baltic assets would involve unknown factors of a kind that I have just outlined. We should, as it were, be issuing a blank cheque, but with the difference that it was the payees' names that were blank. That would not be a prudent course.
Hon. Members opposite moved an Amendment to the Bill in Committee which would have had the effect of enabling a future State to sue in our courts for the return of property formerly belonging to Baltic persons and now to be distributed to the British claimants. This would be an inappropriate procedure. If such States came into existence at some future date and considered that they had a case for the return of the value of the assets that we are proposing to distribute, the appropriate course for them to take would be to present a claim to the British Government through the diplomatic channel. In addressing themselves to any such claim I am sure that the British Government of the day would keep well in mind all the sad history of the Baltic peoples, about which the hon. and gallant Member for Lewes in particular has spoken, and that the British Government would be predisposed to take as sympathetic a view as, in all the

circumstances of the case, they felt to be warranted. Further than that I cannot possibly go today and I hope that the House will not expect me to do so.

9.55 p.m.

Mr. Biggs-Davison: Mr. Biggs-Davison rose—

Mr. Speaker: Order. It is unusual to continue the debate after the winding up speech. However, I have no power to prevent the hon. Gentleman.

Mr. Biggs-Davison: I came to the House with a speech which I had intended to make, and I abandoned that speech because my right hon. and hon. Friends had marshalled the case against the Bill so admirably that I did not think it right to weary the House myself.
I simply asked the Under-Secretary to clear up one point. This was something most damaging to the reputation of Her Majesty's Government. I wanted the Under-Secretary to have a chance of replying to the very serious allegation made by my hon. and gallant Friend the Member for Lewes (Sir T. Beamish). When I put the point to the Under-Secretary and said that I had a letter in my hand which established that the Government had the intention of seeking Parliamentary approval before realising and distributing the assets, he brushed it aside and suggested that I would quote something out of context in an attempt to mislead the House.
I will now quote to the Under-Secretary certain words. If he is not satisfied I will read the entire letter. The words to which I would draw his attention are contained in a letter from the office of the Minister of State, dated 15th June, 1967. The Minister of State is now the Minister without Portfolio. The right hon. Gentleman said in this letter to my hon. and gallant Friend:
It is our intention, subject to Parliamentary authority, to make arrangements to realise the assets (including the gold) remaining in the country and distribute them to those whose claims are, as a result of this agreement, no longer to be pursued.
I will go on if the hon. Gentleman wishes or I will read the entire letter, but I do not think he will feel it is necessary.
Then, again, I think he said something to the effect that it had not been distributed. At any rate it has been realised. In an answer given to my hon. and


gallant Friend the Member for Lewes by the Board of Trade on 6th December, 1967, I read the words:
The gold was sold on 29th June, 1967."—[OFFICIAL FLEPORT, 6th December, 1967; Vol. 755.]
This seems to me clearly without the Parliamentary authority which the right hon. Gent leman the Minister of State gave my hon. and gallant Friend an undertaking would be obtained. This is most damaging to the reputation of Her Majesty's Government and of our country

quite apart from the moral and political argument which has been adduced in this debate.

The House is entitled to a reply. We on this side of the House are unlikely to win this Division, but I hope very much that when this Bill reaches another place justice will be done.

Question put, That the Bill be now read the Third time:—

The House divided: Ayes 161, Noes 115.

Division No. 49.
AYES
10.0 p.m.


Allaun, Frank (Salford, E.)
Gray, Dr. Hugh (Yarmouth)
Morris, Charles R. (Openshaw)


Alldritt, Walter
Gregory, Arnold
Newens, Stan


Anderson, Donald
Grey, Charles (Durham)
Ogden, Eric


Ashton, Joe (Bassetlaw)
Griffiths, David (Rother Valley)
O'Matley, Brian


Atkins, Ronald (Preston, N.)
Griffiths, Eddle (Brightside)
Orme, Stanley


Atkinson, Neman (Tottenham)
Griffiths, Will (Exchange)
Owen, Will (Morpeth)


Bagier, Gordon A. T.
Hamilton, James (Bothwell)
Page, Derek (King's Lynn)


Baxter, William
Hannan, William
Pannell, Rt. Hn. Charles


Beaney, Alan
Harper, Joseph
Pardoe, John


Bessell, Peter
Harrison, Walter (Wakefield)
Park, Trevor


Bidwell, Sydney
Haseldine, Norman
Parker, John (Dagenham)


Bishop, E. S.
Hazell, Bert
Pearson, Arthur (Pontypridd)


Blackburn, F.
Heffer, Eric S.
Peart, Rt. Hn. Fred


Boardman, H. (Leigh)
Henig, Stanley
Perry, Ernest G. (Battersea, S.)


Booth, Albert
Hobden, Dennis
Perry, George H. (Nottingham, S.)


Braddock, Mrs. E. M.
Horner, John
Price, Thomas (Westhoughton)


Brown, Bob (N'ctle-upon-Tyne, W.)
Houghton, Rt. Hn. Douglas
Probert, Arthur


Buchan, Norman
Howarth, Robert (Bolton, E.)
Rankin, John


Buchanan, Richard (G'gow, Sp'burn)
Howell, Denis (Small Heath)
Rees, Merlyn


Butter, Herbert (Hackney, C.)
Hoy, James
Roberts, Albert (Normanton)


Callaghan, Rt. Hn. James
Hughes, Emrys (Ayrshire, S.)
Rose, Paul


Carter-Jones, Lewis
Hunter, Adam
Rowlands. E.


Coe, Denis
Hynd, John
Shaw, Arnold (Ilford, S.)


Coleman, Donalo
Johnston, Russell (Inverness)
Short, Rt. Hn. Renée (W'hampton, N. E.)


Concannon, J. D
Jones, Dan (Burnley)
Silkin, Rt. Hn. John (Deptford)


Crawshaw, Richard
Jones, J. Idwal (Wrexham)
Silkin, Hn. S. C. (Dulwich)


Cullen, Mrs. Alice
Jones, T. Alec (Rhondda, West)
Silverman, Julius


Dalyell, Tam
Judd, Frank
Slater, Joseph


Davidson, Arthur (Accrington)
Kelley, Richard
Small, William


Davies, G. Elfed (Rhondda, E.)
Kenyon, Clifford
Spriggs, Leslie


Davies, Dr. Ernest (Stretford)
Lawson, George
Steel, David (Roxburgh)


Davies, Harold (Leek)
Leadbitter, Ted
Steele, Thomas (Dunbartonshire, W)


Davies, Ifor (Gower)
Lee, Rt. Hn. Frederick (Newton)
Swain, Thomas


Davies, S. O. (Merthyr)
Loughlin, Charles
Taverne, Dick


Delargy, Hugh
Lubbock, Eric
Thomas, Rt. Hn. George


Dell, Edmund
Lyons, Edward (Bradford, E.)
Tinn, James


Dempsey, James
McCann, John
Urwin, T. W.


Dewar, Donald
MacColl, James
Varley, Eric G.


Dobson, Ray
Macdonald, A. H.
Wainwright, Edwin (Dearne Valley)


Doig, Peter
McGuire, Michael
Watkins, David (Consett)


Dunn, James A.
Mackenzie, Alasdair (Ross & Crom'ty)
Watkins, Tudor (Brecon & Radnor)


Dunnett, Jack
Mackintosh, John P.
White, Mrs. Eirene


Dunwoody, Mrs. Gwyneth (Exeter)
Maclennan, Robert
Whitlock, William


Eadie, Alex
MacMlllan, Malcolm (Western Isles)
Wilkins, W. A.


Edwards, Robert (Bilston)
McNamara, J. Kevin
Willey, Rt. Hn. Frederick


Edwards, William (Merioneth)
MacPherson, Malcolm
Williams, Alan Lee (Hornchurch)


Ellis, John
Mahon. Peter (Preston, S.)
Williams, Clifford (Abertillery)


Ennals, David
Mallalieu, E. L. (Brigg)
Williams, W. T. (Warrington)


Evans, Fred (Caerphilly)
Manuel, Archie
Wilson, William (Coventry, S.)


Evans, loan L. (Birm'h'm, Yardley)
Mapp, Charles
Winstanlcy, Dr. M. P.


Fernyhough, E.
Mason, Rt. Hn. Roy
Woof, Robert


Finch, Harold
Mendelson, John



Fletcher, Raymord (Ilkeston)
Millan, Bruce
TELLERS FOR THE AYES:


Galpern, Sir Myer
Miller, Dr. M. S.
Mr. Neil McBride and


Ginsburg, David
Morgan, Elystan (Cardiganshire)
Mr. Alan Fitch.





NOES



Alison, Michael (Barkston Ash)
Balniel, Lord
Boardman, Tom (Leicester, S. W.)


Allason, James (Hemel Hempstead)
Beamish, Col. Sir Tufton
Bossom, Sir Clive


Astor, John
Berry, Hn. Anthony
Brinton, Sir Tatton


Awdry, Daniel
Biggs-Davison, John
Buchanan-Smith, Alick (Angus, N&M)




Buck, Antony (Colchester)
Joseph, Rt. Hn. Sir Keith
Powell, Rt. Hn. J. Enoch


Bullus, Sir Eric
Kaberry, Sir Donald
Ramsden, Rt. Hn. James


Burden, F. A.
Kimball, Marcus
Rees-Davies, w. R.


Campbell, B. (Oldham, W.)
King, Evelyn (Dorset, S.)
Renton, Rt. Hn. Sir David


Campbell, Gordon (Moray & Nairn)
Kirk, Peter
Rodgers, Sir John (Sevenoaks)


Carr, Rt. Hn. Robert
Knight, Mrs. Jill
Rossi. Hugh (Hornsey)


Costain, A. P
Lane, David
Russell, Sir Ronald


Currie, G. B. H.
Langford-Holt, Sir John
Scott-Hopkins, James


Deedes, Rt. Un. w. P. (Ashford)
Lewis, Kenneth (Rutland)
Sharples, Richard


Douglas-Parker, Douglas
Loveys, W. H.
Silvester, Frederick


Elliot, Capt. Walter (Carshalton)
McAdden, Sir Stephen
Smith, Dudley (W'wick & L'mington)


Eltiott. R. W.(N 'c'tle-upon-Tyne. N.)
Mac Arthur, Ian
Smith, John (London & W'minster)


Errington, Sir Eric
McMaster, Stanley
Stainton, Keith


Eyre, Reginald
McNair-Wilson. Patrick
Taylor, Edward M.(G'gow. Cathcart)


Fortescue, Tim
Maddan, Martin
Taylor, Frank (Moss Side)


Foster, Sir John
Maginnis, John E.
Temple, John M.


Gilmour, Sir John (Fife, E.)
Maude, Angus
Thatcher, Mrs. Margaret


Clover, Sir Douglas
Mawby, Ray
Turton, Rt. Hn. R. H.


Goodhart, Philip
Maxwell-Hyslop, R. J.
van Straubenzee, W. R.


Cower, Raymond
Maydon, Lt.-Cmdr. S. L. C.
Waddington, David


Grant, Anthony
Mills, Peter (Torrington)
Walker, Peter (Worcester)


Grant-Ferris, R.
Mills, Stratton (Belfast, N.)
Wall, Patrick


Grieve, Percy
Monro, Hector
Ward, Dame Irene


Gurden, Harold
Morgan, Geraint (Denbigh)
Wells, John (Maidstone)


Halt-Davis, A. G. F.
Morrison, Charles (Devizes)
Whitelaw Rt. Hn. William


Harvey, Sir Arthur Vere
Mott-Radclyffe, Sir Charles
Williams, Donald (Dudley)


Hawkins, Paul
Munro-Lucas-Tooth, Sir Hugh
Wilson Geoffrey (Truro)


Heald, Rt. Hn. Sir Lionel
Murton, Oscar
Wood, Rt. Hn. Richard


Heseltine, Michael
Nabarro, Sir Gerald
Wright, Esmond


Hiley, Joseph
Noble, Rt. Hn. Michael
Wylie, N. R.


Holland, Philip
Onslow, Cranley
Younger Hn George


Howell, David (Guildford)
Osbom, John (Hallam)
younger, Hn. George


Hutchison, Michael Clark
Page, Graham (Crosby)
TELLERS FOR THE NOES:


Iremonger, T. L.
Percival, Ian



Irvine, Bryant Godman (Rye)
Pink, R. Bonner
Mr. Timothy Kitson and


Jopling, Michael
Pounder, Rafton
Mr. Bernard Weatherill.

Bill accordingly read the Third time and passed.

EMPLOYMENT, SUNDERLAND

Motion made, and Question proposed, That this House do now adjourn.—[Mr. Harper.]

10.10 p.m.

Mr. Frederick Willey: With a rate of unemployment of 6 per cent. overall, 9 per cent. for men, there is no need for me to exaggerate the difficulties in Sunderland. At the moment, we have 85 persons unemployed for every vacancy. We can take this consolation, for what it is worth: the position is not as bad as it was in 1962–63. On the other hand, the unemployment this time has been more persistent than it was earlier.
It is important, first, to look at the nature of the unemployment. No less than 60 per cent. of those unemployed are under 45 years of age and 20 per cent. are between the ages of 25 and 34. Within the total of unemployed, there are hundreds of skilled craftsmen. Patently, therefore, the unemployed are a good labour force; patently, they are employable; and patently, if we had the opportunities that obtain in the Midlands and the South-East, we would have as low figures of unemployment as they have.
Nearly 400 miners are unemployed, just on 800 shipyard workers and, although we have considerable development going on in the town, 1,500 construction workers. If these figures are meaningful they stress the importance of training and retraining. One realises this by looking even at the basic industries, such as shipbuilding. Here one appreciates the importance of the present six-month training course for skilled machinists. It is urgent that we should make wider provision for training and retraining.
I do not suggest that nothing has been done. I have paid tribute to my hon. Friend the Parliamentary Secretary to the Board of Trade for the energy she has shown in tackling our problems. In our major industry, shipbuilding, and its ancillaries, we have stable employment and the prospect of it for several years ahead. The Furness Yard can now promise 350 men their jobs. In the case of coal, although we have been affected by two pit closures, we have in the Wear-mouth Colliery again stable employment.
The problem with us is that, although we are providing security of employment in these industries which have been wracked by insecurity before, we are providing that security for fewer men, so


that we are aggravating our unemployment difficulties.
I also acknowledge what has been done through development area policy. We have benefited from the massive aid given—the grants and loans, the regional employment premium, the rigorous I.D.C. policy and factory building. We are delighted that, today, my right hon. Friend the President of the Board of Trade has announced that two more advance factories are to be built in Sunderland- We appreciate that development has begun on the Board of Trade estate at Pennywell, and that the corporation will be beginning work on the Leechmere Estate.
At the same time—and very important—there are considerable developments in the town itself. The central redevelopment scheme is nearing completion and this makes an enormous difference to the commercial centre. The civic development is making good progress and will be completed next year. Although I am unrepentant in demanding a technological university for Sunderland, we have one of the first polytechnics.
Again, and also of considerable importance, We have had a dramatic change in the provision of the roads servicing Sunderland. The driving of an M-road through the county and the opening of the Tyne Tunnel has brought in its train considerable road development which has made an enormous difference to our communications.
In other words, although we are enduring hard times, I would not complain that the time is being wasted. A good deal has been done and, because of this, I believe that now we should make a real drive to obtain more employment for the town. The foundations have been laid and we had better build upon them.
I have always said that I believe development area policy to be too diffuse and not sufficiently specific. I have mentioned, as an example of specific aid—the Furness Yard. This has fully justified the Government money which has been put in. In the same way, I would like to see more specific direct action about the advance factory which, unfortunately, still remains vacant. I know all the difficulties about this factory, but I believe that the Department

should give this matter top priority. Our needs are much greater than those of other places in the development area.
We have argued generally about preference in Government contracts. We in Sunderland benefit a good deal from Government contracts, but I would like a more specific preference to be given, not so much to the development area, but to Sunderland.
I argue—as I always have done—that development area policy is not sufficiently comprehensive and inclusive. I am sure that the River Wear Commissioners could say that the increase in port dues makes sense. I am sure that the National Coal Board could say that the closure of the Wearmouth staiths makes sense. I am certain that the Ministry of Transport could say that centralised registration makes sense. I expect that British Railways will be able to make a substantial case to justify the withdrawal of the direct services.
What we do not appreciate sufficiently, however, is the cumulative effect on Sunderland of all those decisions and the cumulative effect at this time of such great difficulty. I have mentioned the port and I hope that someone will look at the recent suggestion that we should have the development of a small containerisation berth similar to that at Leith.
We should equally pay the same attention and regard to Government capital expenditure generally. Although this might make good sense Departmentally, I feel, in the same way, that insufficient attention is paid to the specific effect that this can have on a place like Sunderland, with its present heavy unemployment. I would not for one moment complain that Sunderland has not had its fair share of the school building programme, but I would like specific attention to be paid to Sunderland. I would like reconsideration of the St. Aidans proposals in the light of our current difficulties. It is also relevant in this context, as I have always argued, that the Government should consider backing development area policy with public enterprise. We should not stop merely at providing the factory buildings. Where there are difficulties such as we have in Sunderland, we should consider public enterprise supporting not only


the factory construction, but also production in the factories.
I have paid genuine tribute to my hon. Friend the Parliamentary Secretary. Both my hon. Friend the Member for Sunderland, South (Mr. Bagier) and I appreciate very much what she has done in aiding us in Sunderland. At the same time, this is a matter of general policy and I am not being personal in saying that there is not a sufficient awareness of Sunderland's problems, either in Whitehall or, for that matter, in the region.
Mr. Dan Smith visited us 12 months ago, but I am not satisfied that the Northern Economic Planning Council, perhaps because of the way it is constituted, pays sufficient regard to the particular problems of Sunderland. It is for this reason that I have in the past argued that we should have special area status for Sunderland. I know that the Department can say, as it has done before, that that status was devised for areas with exceptionally high unemployment through pit closures, but with 400 miners unemployed, I claim that we qualify on that ground.
What I am concerned about, however, and what the Department and the Government are concerned about, are exceptional circumstances, which we are suffering. My plea and that of my hon. Friend is that the special difficulties of Sunderland should be recognised. In speaking of the special difficulties of Sunderland, one is bound to recognise the difficulties of the whole Wearside complex. If we do that I am convinced it would lead to the conclusion that what we need on Wearside is a large industrial estate—in spite of the fact that we are having the Pennywell and the Leechmere estates developed. I know the difficulties about land, but there are at least two sites which ought to be considered. What I am anxious about is that in tackling a problem like this we should look at it comprehensively and inclusively and recognise that Sunderland—this is very important to our future—is not only an industrial town but a commercial centre and ought to be the hub of this industrial area.
What I hope this debate will do is that it will emphasise to my hon. Friend the

need for immediate and urgent action. I am convinced that if we take this opportunity that we now have for a greater push that action will be effective and will help us with our problems in Sunderland.

10.21 p.m.

Mr. Gordon A. T. Bagier: It is very difficult in the very short time which is available to us tonight to raise the whole of the problems of Wearside, and difficult, also, not to duplicate what my right hon. Friend the Member for Sunderland, North (Mr. Willey) has said; and in following him I say at once that I completely underline every one of the points he has made, though I will try to make one or two additional points.
I recall rising in a similar Adjournment debate in July, 1967, to draw the attention of this House to the serious situation in Sunderland. I hoped that this time, 18 months later, we could have a different atmosphere. We have; but, unfortunately, that atmosphere is one of a worsening situation, particularly because of the numbers of unemployed we have in the town. The situation can be analysed in many different ways. We can accept that the Government have poured a tremendous amount of help into the area, and that Sunderland has had a fair share. We can accept that the shipbuilding industry is a much more stabilised industry than it was 18 months or two years ago.
This has all been achieved by positive Government help, and we have no grumbles there, but one of the effects of rationalisation, of Geddes, is to have produced a stabilised work force which, unfortunately, is not an increased work force, and this is having its effect in not taking up the slack of the number of unemployed, and our unemployment figures have gone up.
What is our need? What we really need is a complete examination of what are the various and numerous factors which my right hon. Friend has mentioned and the accumulation of which contributes to our difficulties—the centralisation of various bodies towards Tees-side and Tyneside, the centralisation of various things in Wearmouth. There is an accumulation of different things which add up to a rather bad story for Sunderland. A significant number of construction workers, a very high proportion,


about 1,500, are out of work, and that augurs very badly for the future. It is very significant that the housebuilding programme; which the corporation was planning has dried up, and that will add to the problems within the next year.
It is very difficult to take the Government to task by saying they have not done enough. It is extremely difficult to say what we would do more which would solve the problem. We give credit to the Government, as my right hon. Friend has done, and to their various methods of aid given to us. Nevertheless, the positive fact remains that we have a worsening situation.
I would call on my hon. Friend to have conversations with various Ministries which could help. For example, the Treasury could be approached with a positive request that in deciding the site of the Inland Revenue's Schedule E computer centre Wearside should be considered. I see no earthly reason why it should not be considered for that. If other bodies can talk about centralising from Sunderland to Newcastle because it is only 13 to 15 miles away, then there is no reason why the reverse argument should not apply, and I would ask my hon. Friend to press strongly our claims, which we have been pressing over a period of months now, that Sunderland should be given considerable thought as the site of the Inland Revenue's Schedule E computer.
I underline the plea of my right hon. Friend for special development area status. I appreciate, as he did, that this is tied up with the aid given for the running down of the coal mining industry. We are surrounded by pockets and areas of special development status and there is no telling how much this affects the final decision of where industry will or will not settle. The additional aid which may be given to special development areas is significant and may make just that difference.
There have been many inquiries about the North-East being a development area. When I have ask the North-East Development Council and other bodies about Sunderland, I am interested in knowing the answer. Quite often the answer is in terms of hard brutal cash. That is one aspect and the other aspect

is land. As a region we have our problems, but I can see a little light at the end of the day. There has been a vast improvement in many parts of the region, which is shown by the figures, but the figures for Wearside make a sad story.
For every male vacancy in the Wearside area, which takes in a slightly larger catchment area than Sunderland alone, 85 men are chasing every vacancy, compared with 13 on Tyneside, eight on Tees-side and three for Great Britain as a whole. Those figures are far more significant than the percentages of unemployed. For the man who is unemployed the percentage is 100 per cent., but in areas where the percentage of unemployment is 40 per cent. there may be only eight people unemployed. The 5,000 unemployed, and 7,000 taking the whole of the Wearside areas, calls for serious thinking from the Government.
While I pay tribute to the Government for the various aids which have already been given, I want to repeat what I said in 1967, that it is time private enterprise proved that there was a bit more enterprise about them and took advantage of these highly skilled unemployed men who are only too anxious to use their skills to add to the national cake instead of taking out of it. There are many willing and able workers on Wearside who want to help to increase the gross national product of the country instead of taking out of it.
I hope that my hon. Friend has taken note of what my right hon. Friend and I have said. I am sure that she will have done so, and that she will draw the attention of all the Ministries who can help us through this difficult period on Wearside.

10.19 p.m.

The Parliamentary Secretary to the Board of Trade (Mrs. Gwyneth Dunwoody): My right hon. Friend the Member for Sunderland, North (Mr. Willey) has done a great deal to bring to the attention of the House the problems of Sunderland. I have listened with great interest to his remarks and to those of my hon. Friend the Member for Sunderland, South (Mr. Bagier).
I share their concern about the high level of unemployment in Sunderland, and on Greater Wearside generally, but,


as I hope to indicate in the short time available to me, the picture is not entirely black and there are real grounds for confidence in the future of the area. Wearside has been affected by the decline in the heavy industries which have traditionally been the mainstay of employment in the area, but the measures which have been taken to encourage new industry into the area are having a definite effect, and I look forward to a greater diversification of industry on Wearside with a consequently broader and stronger base on which to build its prosperity.
This is not say, of course, that the traditional industries will no longer play an important part in the economy of the area. It is encouraging to know, for example, shipbuilding order books are in a healthy state, with 36 ships currently on order on Greater Wearside to a total of over three-quarters of a million gross tons.
I hope my right hon. Friend will forgive me if I do not confine consideration of the problem to too narrow an area, for we must not reject any solution which would involve people travelling reasonable distances to work, if they will assist the employment pattern. Daily travel-to-work is increasingly an accepted part of life for a great many people, and in an area with good transport facilities it should not be a great hardship. The analysis of the travel-to-work pattern for the Sunderland County Borough which derives from the 1961 Census shows that over 16,000 residents of Sunderland County Borough worked elsewhere, but on the other hand, there were nearly 11,000 people who worked in the area but were resident elsewhere. The whole of the area I would like to discuss tonight does lie within ten miles of the centre of Sunderland.
My right hon. Friend has argued that special development area benefits should be made available in Sunderland. I can assure him that this is a proposal to which I have given careful thought on several occasions in recent months. I have, however, come to the conclusion—and this is the answer which I have to give to my right hon. Friend tonight—that we would not be justified in giving special development area status to Wearside or to Sunderland alone. The House will recall that the special development areas were

created in November, 1967 for a specific purpose—the provision of new jobs in areas where the impact of the colliery closure programme was likely to be felt most acutely, although I take the point made by my hon. Friend that there are unemployed miners in Sunderland.
The places which have been chosen as special development areas are, in general, those areas where, in the absence of special measures, the run-down in coal mining was expected to cause very high and persistent unemployment. Many of these places are remote areas where there is at present little or no alternative employment to coal mining. Although there have been pit closures in the Sunderland area, local industry is becoming more diversified and new firms are being attracted into the area. If special development area incentives were extended more widely, their impact would be lessened in those places which are likely to find most difficulty in attracting new industry.
As my right hon. Friend well knows, special development area benefits are already available over a substantial part of the North-East; and their extension to so large an industrial complex as Wear-side would inevitably to some extent be at the expense of existing special development areas in the Northern Region and elsewhere.
I realise that my hon. Friend is very concerned, as we all are, about the fact that the Board of Trade factory in Sunderland is awaiting a tenant. It is very unfortunate that this factory, is taking longer than some to obtain a tenant and to make its contribution to the employment needs of Sunderland, despite the fact that no effort has been spared to bring the premises to the notice of all interested enquirers.
I hope that my right hon. Friend will accept that we in the Board of Trade are fully seized of the urgency of the problem facing Sunderland. We are not complacent about the difficulties, and are doing all that we can to get the factory filled. On the other hand, I am sure that he will be encouraged to know that we still have faith in the attractiveness of Sunderland to industry. This faith has been demonstrated today by the announcement by my right hon. Friend


the President of the Board of Trade that the programme of new Board of Trade advance factories includes not merely one but two factories on the Pennywell Estate. I am glad that we are able to see the Pennywell Estate going ahead in a constructive fashion. My right hon. Friend and my hon. Friend are aware that we have had considerable geological difficulties with this site. In spite of the efforts that have been made, not only by my Department but those concerned in the setting up of this trading estate, there has been some difficulty simply in getting ahead as a result of the geological problems which needed to be solved before we could build on the site. These factories will be of 15,000 and 25,000 square feet respectively. With the existing factory of 50,000 square feet and with these two factories to come, all with room for expansion, we shall be able to meet a considerable range of demand for different sizes of factory.
Additionally, further factory building is in prospect at Houghton-le-Spring, and the Washington Development Corporation have four factories currently available. Any industrialist with this area in mind can be sure of finding not only a factory suited to his needs, but a fund of highly skilled and willing workers.
During 1968, the Board of Trade arranged visits to Sunderland by eight firms interested in moving into the area, and to Washington by 48.
Washington New Town, five miles west of Sunderland, is beginning to make an important contribution to the economic expansion of the area. Since the designation of Washington as a new town in 1964, 30 factories have been built, of which 27 are occupied, another 10 are under construction and 18 are planned to start construction this year. Naturally, many of the people who work in these factories will have their homes in Washington, but there has been specific agreement between the Washington Development Corporation and the Sunderland Council that the Development Corporation would do all they could in their factory programme to provide jobs for Sunderland residents.
During the past three years, nine new firms have established themselves, or are in the process of doing so, in the Sunderland, Southwick, Houghton-le-Spring and

Washington employment exchange areas, and when these factories are in full production over 1,100 jobs will be provided. A little further afield, but still of prime importance for employment prospects in the area is the major development by the Avon Rubber Co. in Washington.
That this is a continuing trend is shown by the fact that since 1st January, 1966, 57 industrial development certificates totalling over 1·9 million square feet and estimated to provide 3,900 jobs have been issued for the Greater Wearside area.
Jobs in prospect expected to arise in the Sunderland area within the next four years in authorised new industrial buildings and in existing buildings taken over by manufacturing firms amount to 2,310 including 1,850 for males. In the Greater Wearside area there are about 3,400 jobs in prospect, including over 2,500 for males.
While the traditional industries of Wearside are nearing the end of a painful but essential reshaping, the new industry is on its way into the area. We realise that the immediate problem concerns not only my right hon. Friend, but his hon. Friend.
My hon. Friend the Member for Sunderland, South raised a valid point. He asked whether we may, through Whitehall, take a more immediate and interventionist rôle in some of the problems, such as those that could be raised by the setting up of the computer centre. I hope that my hon. Friend will not feel that I am being too depressing, but when these opportunities arise for the dispersal of Government offices we survey the whole sphere of development areas. Sunderland would certainly be considered equally with other places where the project is suitable for a town the size of Sunderland. For a large project, with special requirements and employment potential of 2,000 to 3,000 tax staff, however, Sunderland might find it difficult to accommodate them. Nevertheless, we will certainly bear this very much in mind and bring it to the attention of the Department concerned.
I do not wish to be overconfident or to appear to undervalue the real and immediate social problems that I know Sunderland is facing, but I have confidence in


its future. I hope that certainly within a very short time my right hon. Friend and my hon. Friend will be able to come to the House and say that they feel that

some part of their immediate problems have been dealt with.

Question put and agreed to.

Adjourned accordingly at twenty minutes to Eleven o'clock.